#2 more years without the guardians and this is where this email would find him | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

artxyra · 5 years ago

Text

In Her Darkest Moment - Part 2

Part 1 | 2 | 3

Note: The song inspiration came from Utada Hikaru & Skrillex Face My Fears. Yes, there will be a part 3. It just felt right to end the part where it was rather than continue it to be a completed two-shot story. Don’t know when the next part will be out but I did start it.

Marinette’s day started off okay. Her usual clients emailed her for some design commission, her lovers decided that today they would the day that they make breakfast for her, but the day comes to still when she sees an official letter in the mail.

You Are Invited to Lycée Fantômette Dupont Reunion!

Oh yes, an invitation to the worse years of her life. It still amazes her how she was able to graduate with all her absent days and constant visits to the dean’s office.

“Did you see the news?” Marinette turns to see Kagami, dress in a casual black and red jumpsuit.

Marinette sighs and places the letter down. She didn’t know how to answer this. There were already too many memories running through her brain to even think of a proper reply.

“You don’t have to say anything.” Kagami comforts placing a kiss on the conflicted woman’s cheek. “If it makes you feel any better, we don’t have to go.”

Marinette shakes her head, “No, we should go. I want to see whether or not they have changed enough to understand that her lies have consequences.”

Kagami takes a step back, a hand coving her heart. A smile sneaks it away onto the Japanese’s native woman. “Of course, you would. Should I tell Fe and Luka of your decision?”

Marinette nods, “That would be wise. Actually…I might have something better in mind.” The designer teases biting her bottom lip.

Kagami has known Marinette long enough to know that mischief is that woman’s best friend through thick and thin. Nodding, Kagami notices the time and rushes out of the room. Marinette lets out a small chuckle and returns to reading the letter.

There is never a bad time to face her past, and as much as she blocked out everything regarding her times in Lycée, there were still some good memories. It’s an odd feeling to have ten years’ worth of fear piling in her small body structure, but she didn’t want to linger on to that feeling any longer.

Burying herself in her commissions, Marinette barely heard the slamming of her office door late on that evening.

“This is ridiculous, utterly ridiculous!” A certain blonde shout to the heavens. Marinette stops her sowing and turns to see one of her closest friends, who’s chest is out and seething. Pushing the fabric aside, the bluenette gets up and lightly push against the blonde’s shoulder.

“What happened?” She asks looking at the blonde in the eyes.

Chloe huffs and folds her arms, “Our favorite liar decided that it would be useful to use your name once more for personal gain.”

Marinette’s bluebell eyes widen. She stands frozen against Chloe. Her breathing quickens as the once buried memories flood their way into her mind. Subconsciously, she touches her shoulder and rubs her forearm.

Chloe quickly notices the woman’s actions and guide her to the futon. Siting blue-haired woman down, Chloe immediately tries to get her to do some breathing exercises. Realizing that wasn’t working, Chloe pulls out her phone calls the others. Luka’s the first to answer.

“She’s having a panic attack,” Chloe immediately states, placing the call on the speaker.

Luka immediate sings a soft lullaby, as Chloe adds Félix and Kagami to the call.

“Netta, listen to us, you are safe, she can’t get to you now.” Félix states in the softest voice he could muster.

As the three lovers try to soothe their love, Chloe paces back and forth thinking of possible ways to get the panic woman out of her attack. She hates seeing Marinette like this, Lycée was hard on all of them and here was the past creeping its way back up to them.

They have created a life outside of lycée, away from their former classmates and tormentors. Marinette became a successful designer despite doing it under a pseudonym named Fortunate Red, Kagami being a fencing instructor and agent, Félix becoming a well-known lawyer, Luka taking off in his solo career as a rock star, and her being the best damn PR specialist for the group.

“I think she’s coming to.” Chloe acknowledges seeing the clouded look in Marinette’s eyes fade away. Immediately after saying that, the three on the phone simultaneously sighs in relief.

“That’s good to hear, Chloe,” Kagami states what they all were thinking. “Please keep an eye on her. We know how much she hates it, but I wouldn’t want to take the risk.” The others were quick to agree but not without promises of being home soon.

The call ends; Marinette shakes the daze away and looks around. “What happened?”

Chloe pinches the bridge of her nose and murmurs, “You don’t want to know. Anyways, as your PR, I advise you to stay away from social media, especially your old accounts.”

Marinette tilts her head sideways, why would Chloe mention her practically dead social media accounts? She hasn’t posted anything on there in ten years—perhaps it was longer than that.

“I won’t. I promise.” Marinette promise. “I think I need to take a walk—a break, maybe. I promise Madeline that I would meet her at the café.”

Chloe gives Marinette a reassuring smile.

“Maybe I should go with you, besides I miss Madeline.” Chloe offers.

“You don’t have to do that; besides, I will have Tikki and Plagg with me.”

“I thought Plagg was with Félix.”

“He didn’t want to listen to another long meeting without cheese being present.” Marinette giggles.

Chloe loves these moments. Moments when Marinette is herself, carefree, and the weight of her past behind her even if it’s for a moment.

“Fine, you can go but the moment Madeline calls us, we’re going in.” Chloe readjusts her purse, “Also tell her to call me, she missed our last dinner date because of the late-night rush at the restaurant.”

Marinette nods and calls for the two kwamis out of their miniature house. Due to Marinette becoming the guardian of Miraculous box once she was fully trained, she felt bad for the kwamis and decided to make them a little house—similar to a dollhouse—for them to live and have fun in. It works out as it gave something to come back to and give them all personal spaces.

“So, Marinette are you going to go to the reunion?” Tikki wonders flying next to her chosen.

Marinette didn’t answer. Her mind wanders off to the possibilities that could happen regarding the decision to go. They always did say the best way to be free is to face the fears that are holding you back.

~*~

Breaking News: Lila Agreste nee Rossi claims that her husband Adrien Agreste is having an affair with a former Lycée classmate!

“I caught them in our bed!” Rossi claims. “This wasn’t the first time, either!”

Headlines: Adrien Agreste remains silent at this acquisition.

Headlines: Are Rossi and Agreste getting a divorce?

Breaking News: Rossi claims that former classmate Marinette Dupain-Cheng is a homewrecker!

~*~

Marinette couldn’t help but feel an enormous amount of guilt. Chloe’s warning may have done her good on the social media part, but it didn’t stop her from seeing the newspaper and hearing the whispers behind her back as she continues with her daily routine.

“You shouldn’t be reading those, Netta. We don’t want you to have another relapse.” Luka states wrapping his arms around her shoulder.

“I-I-I can’t help it.” She stutters, her voice cracking. “I haven’t seen or spoken to any of them in a long time, so why put my name out there?” She ponders covering her face an attempt to hide from the world around her.

“You’re not obligated to attend the reunion.” Luka reminds her, but Marinette shakes her head.

“It won’t do me any good to stay away now. That will only make me look guilty to those that still believe her lies.”

She did have a point. Everyone in their graduating class received the invite and nearly everyone in Marinette’s class believed the lies especially after the photo incident.

Luka sighs and a quick text to Félix.

“I guess I’ll get the car prepared, then.”

Marinette goes to kiss Luka’s cheek, allowing herself to feel a little peace with this decision.

~*~

Lila couldn’t believe how easy it was to bring the Dupont’s everyday Ladybug name back into her crazy schemes for attention and power. All it took was a little bit of blackmailing on some well-known reporters and the waterworks.

No matter what, she will get her happy ending. Lila believed she thought her plan entirely through. Soon Juleka would be able to sway her rock star of a brother into her scheme allowing her to be his lover. Adrien was dead to her. She dried him the minute they got married, but her spot-light fantasy faded away when Gabriel Agreste had to file bankruptcy. It was then that Lila knew she needed someone better, richer, and handsome than the former model.

“I can’t believe that Marinette would do such a thing to you Lila.” Alya spats clearly angered at her former best friend for all the pain she causes the Italian woman.

Cue the waterworks, “It’s true, I caught them. She didn’t bat an eye when she rushed out of the house.”

Alya immediately goes to comfort the teary-eyed black widow.

“I would feel embarrassed for Marinette if she dared showed her face here tonight.” Lila couldn’t help but internally smirk at the damage she has caused.

“Oh look, there’s Rose, Juleka, and Alix over by the punch bowl.” Alya attempts to direct the conversation to something else.

Lila cheekily smiles and allows herself to be dragged over to the punch bowl. Alya immediately greets the small group of women.

“I heard about your divorce, Alya, how are you doing?” Alix cautiously asked despite the concerned look she’s giving to the reporter.

Alya sighs, “It was hard, but we manage to get an agreement for the kids.”

Alya wasn’t alright, she loved Nino with all her being, but when he asked for a divorce, it was out of the blue and she was going through a hard time finding a new journalism agency. Together they have twin boys that were as energetic as their mother when she was teen chasing after Ladybug.

“Oh my, I didn’t realize and here I am in tears about my marriage.” Lila gasps bringing the conversation back on her. Alya gives the Italian woman a soft smile and hands her a glass of punch. “So Juleka, is your brother joining us this evening?”

Juleka shrugs and pulls Rose into a side embrace. “He told me it was possible as his girlfriend is also a part of our graduating class.”

Lila nearly spits out her drink, “G-girlfriend.” She stutters cursing in the back of her mind that her plan was already going down like a sinking ship.

“Uh…yeah. I think he’s planning on proposing soon but we haven’t been in contact since the start of his tour.” Juleka adds cautiously seeing the slight change in Lila’s behavior.

Lila sends Juleka a sheepish smile and turns around to fold her arms against her chest.

“Well I do hope he shows up, it will be nice to see whom he’s dating.” Alya wonders, probably thinking of a new scoop for her blog.

~*~

Marinette is feeling a panic attack approaching, that or a nervous breakdown. Since the last time she saw the news, more information regarding the cheating scandal came to light. Reporters are going at each other throats about the lack of truth and trying to make as much sense as to why this story is just now coming out. Few of them tried to contact her, but she told them they had the wrong number.

“Deep breaths, Netta, we’re almost there.” Félix softly whispers into her ear holding the bluenette’s hand in his own.

Félix’s right, she does need to calm down.

The limo stops in front of the venue that the school provided for such an event. It was time for her to face her fears.

Exiting the limo, Marinette could only wish that she had taken up Tikki’s offer for her to accompany her, but she denied seeing as Félix, Kagami and Luka would be there with her. Even though their poly-relationship is hidden from the public they every much have a plan. Kagami’s dating Luka while she’s dating Félix. They only hope to marry one another one day but they’re happy with their dynamic.

“I’m ready.” Marinette murmurs, but her tense shoulders and quicken breathes would say otherwise.

“Baby steps, Netta, baby steps.” Kagami grabs hold of her black and blue-haired lover’s arm and walks towards the entrance.

Entering the banquet hall, Marinette could spot her other favorite blonde amid a conversation she clearly did not want to be in. Thankfully, Chloe caught sight of them and excuse herself from the conversation.

“Nette!” Chloe exclaims, but not before wishing that her voice was a little bit lowered.

Everyone has their eyes on the group of newcomers. Gossip spread throughout the adults and the majority of it was how Marinette showed her face to them after what she had done to Lila’s marriage.

“How are you doing?” Chloe asks her friend. “Don’t worry, my guys and I are working overtime to get this scandal handled. I’m sure Félix is putting together a case against Rossi and whoever’s involved with this.”

“That would be wrong of me to not help save my Netta’s reputation, Bourgeois,” Félix states wrapping his arms around Marinette’s small waist.

“Félix!” Marinette stares at him in shock. A small weight of negative emotions are lifted from her shoulders.

Félix gives her heartfelt smile and gently place a kiss on her temple.

Very audible gasps fill the ambient sounds.

Alya angerly charges towards the happy group with fire in her eyes. “How could you, Marinette! You show your disgraceful face here and have the audacity to kiss another man when you’re hoeing around with Adrien.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Cesaire. I haven’t seen Agreste in years.” Marinette states clinging to Félix’s blazer.

Alya screeches, her hand making a swing at Marinette. However, if it wasn’t for Félix grabbing her wrist mid-swing, Marinette would have been hurt.

“That is enough, Cesaire.” Félix growls, his cat-like instincts kicking in. “Marinette and I came here to have a good time and it would rude of you to act out at such a formal event.”

He then violently shoves her wrist away. Alya gawks at him.

“Your so-called girlfriend has been hooking up with another man behind your back and you’re acting like everything is okay.” Alya shrieks and if there wasn’t a crowd before, there was one now.

“I have not been hooking up with other men. I love Félix and I would never cheat on him.” Marinette sneers, her fears of the past coming at her was being boiled away by fury red anger. If Hawkmoth was still in action, this would have the perfect time to become Scarlet Moth. The amount of fury, confusion, and sadness ran high at the reunion.

Part 3

#fic: In Her Darkest Moments #miraculous ladybug #ml fanfic #miraculous ladybug fanfic #miraculous ladybug au #ml au #marinette dupain cheng #ml felix #kagami tsurugi #luka couffaine #more edits to come later #so did you guess the ship right

350 notes · View notes

prof-iupin · 5 years ago

Note

Do you have any Pettigrew HCs? Most fics I find write him out...

I can't see the full ask on my phone, and after several attempts at opening tumblr on my laptop (and failing, because I couldn't remember which email this account was linked to), I've decided to be a bit assumptious:

I do have several hcs for peter tbh, and most of them are really nice, but writing it into the fic such that the fated night happens either way proves harder than expected. Here are my hcs tho!

Peter was probably Remus' first friend on the train. We know Sirius and James were in the same compartment, but poor ol' Remmy was probably feeling like an outcast when a nervous, kind boy asked if he could share the compartment

And they immediately hit it off, talking about the Beatles and all sorts of muggle (and wizard) topics - note, Pete is a half-blood in my hc

And at the Welcoming Feast, Sirius points our Remus' scars ("Woah! Those are cool! How'd you get them?") and Peter notices that Remus got uncomfortable, so he immediately changed the subject without arousing the least suspicion

So maybe Peter wasn't the best at Transfiguration, but you know what he was bloody good at? DADA. Every year, the professor was always impressed - he got an O in his OWLs and in his NEWTs, and the marauders affectionately dubbed him their guardian

In a way, he really was. he wasn't as arrogant and boisterous as James and Sirius, and he was actually really good at coming up with cover up plans. Where Moony would do the planning, Pads and Prongs would pull the prank off, Wormtail always made sure their tracks were covered and their goals achieved.

He was absolutely madly terribly in love with Emmeline Vance.

He would have no trouble talking up any female at Hogwarts, but then he'd glance at Em and his tongue would freeze and his cheeks would redden and he cannot for the life of him change

And then Prongs offers him a lesson in confidence, and Peter tries asking Emmeline out

It's a complete disaster!

But she says yes anyway, because against all odds, Peter Pettigrew was a charmer.

He was friends with everyone

And no one ever suspected him?? "Professor, may I be excused?" was marauders for "I have a prank to execute, excuse me" and this only ever worked for Remus and him because they were the innocent one of the four

You know how James and Sirius are described as brothers? Like there's always this one person in the group you're closest to? Remus was that for Peter.

And sometimes, years later, James and Sirius might slip and forget that Remus wasn't feeling too well.

Peter never forgot.

In fact, once, on their first full moon, Peter froze, and he couldn't transform into his animagus, but he still didn't run away from Remus. Pads and Prongs were pushing him away, but Peter looked into Moony's eyes.

"I've got this," he almost communicated telepathically, and he did "got this" because not a second later was Wormtail running around with glee

So it's 2:30 am and I'm studying physics, so this is what I could think of! Feel free to request more!

#peter pettigrew headcanon #peter pettigrew #marauders #marauders hc #marauders headcanon #marauders era #harry potter headcanon #harry potter post #messrs moony wormtail padfoot and prongs #moony wormtail padfoot and prongs #wormtail

94 notes · View notes

quicksilversquared · 5 years ago

Text

Crash and Burn: Chapter 2: Glowing Embers

Everyone in Paris had always assumed that if Hawkmoth were to die, it would be mid-battle with the superheroes, or maybe in a jail cell years down the road, after being defeated. No one expected him to die suddenly in a car crash on a sunny afternoon.

Least of all, his son.

links in the reblog

oi staff where’s the page break line

By the time Chat Noir got home- the next morning, after falling asleep in Ladybug's arms on top of the Eiffel Tower and both of them sleeping soundly there for the entire night- several responsibilities had been lifted off of his shoulders.

The Gorilla had stepped in as Adrien's guardian and the runner of the house, as he was both Adrien's bodyguard and (apparently- Adrien hadn't known this before) his mom's cousin. He was going to make all of the arrangements for the burial, and had offered to set up a funeral until Adrien told him that he didn't really want to bother with that.

The Gorilla didn't look as surprised as Adrien had thought, but then again he had seen the relationship between father and son deteriorate through the years. More than anyone in the house, he had cared for Adrien, letting him escape to spend time with his friends as long as Adrien wasn't being chased by mobs of people. And the last several times when there had been interest in Adrien after a commercial aired, the Gorilla had opted to just accompany Adrien wherever he wanted to go around Paris rather than trying to drag him back home.

(Nooroo had also cleared the Gorilla of all guilt the previous day in a rare bit of actual good news- he had never suspected his employer's supervillain activities at all, and he had been an avid supporter of Ladybug and Chat Noir.)

As a bonus, the Gorilla also knew who all of Mr. Agreste's legal people were, and what needed to be done to start transferring bank accounts and deeds and everything. It was just one more big thing that Adrien didn't have to take care of.

In fact, now that Ladybug had told Chat Noir that she could do the announcement to Paris on her own so that he didn't have to be there and struggle to keep a neutral expression in front of the crowds of reporters and that she would bring the two recovered Miraculous to Master Fu, Adrien didn't really have anything left on his list of things that he had to take care of. He just had to sort through his own feelings and try to get back to some sense of normalcy, which...

Well, it was still a lot, but it wasn't an overwhelming lot. And as a bonus, Ladybug had suggested a nightly meet-up so that they could cuddle and he could have a safe place to talk through his feelings and everything that had happened.

(She. Was. Amazing.)

"You don't have to do this right away, kid, you know that, right?"

Adrien shook his head as he picked his way through the graveyard, following the instructions that he had found tucked in the last journal. "I want to see Mom's gravestone. I've not gotten any closure with that, and this- even if I never got a funeral for her, this- this is something."

Maybe he was upset with his mom right now, upset that she apparently hadn't been the person that he had thought she was and heartbroken at the lies. But in his memories, she was still a caring mother, not- not the lady that the journals had described, who used the hypnotic powers of the Peacock (powers that Adrien hadn't even been aware existed, even though- well, peacock, hypnotism, that did make sense) to pull more investors onboard with supporting Gabriel and to get influential fashion columnists to write favorably about the company in their columns, advancing the company far faster than it would have gotten on its own otherwise.

It had been supremely selfish and manipulative. Maybe there were no real lingering negativeeffects since Gabriel was a strong company even without the help and all the pushes had done was speed up the rate at which the company joined the topmost fashion brands in Europe- the investors certainly hadn't lost any money, and it was hardly as though the columnists had gotten in trouble for writing about Gabriel- but that didn't make it right.

"Seeing a stone is closure?"

"It's an ending, at least." Adrien checked his copy of the instructions again before taking a turn and heading up another path, pulling his hoodie tighter around himself. "I'll know where she is, which is more than I've been able to say for the past several years."

The plot that Adrien finally arrived at was tucked into the back of the cemetery, far out of the way of prying eyes. It was surrounded by old stones, from people who had long since passed and whose immediate family had probably died long ago, too. That meant that the flowers sitting at the small, relatively plain gravestone stuck out all the more.

Adrien had thought that his father would have gone for something large and gaudy. Subtle had never been his thing- the giant portrait above the stairs, the multiple paintings of his mom, and the statue of Emilie Agreste near their house attested to that, as did the two (two!) lairs of his that Nooroo had told Adrien about- but clearly he hadn't wanted to draw any attention to the grave, not when Emilie Agreste was still officially listed as a missing person.

"He was here recently," Plagg commented, flying over to the flowers. "These are fresh, probably from a couple days ago."

"Yeah." Adrien fingered one of the flowers, inspecting the fairly fresh petals. There were orchids and fern leaves and several other kinds of flowers that he didn't recognize in it, all fresh. It was so fresh that Adrien wouldn't be surprised if his father had put out the bouquet before leaving for the investor's meeting that he had never returned from. "He left the house only every couple days unless he had company stuff that needed him to attend in person, and I bet that this is where he went whenever he left. And this is an obnoxious bouquet- I bet every last one of them were like this."

"The next plot over is empty," Plagg said, flying around. "I bet your father bought both at once. And he intended to be buried in the second one."

Adrien let out a huff, sparing the empty plot a quick glance. "Well, if the Gorilla finds the paperwork for it, fine. That's one less thing to bother with. Otherwise, who cares what his wishes were?"

He didn't stay at his mom's grave for long. There were things he wanted to say, maybe, questions he wanted to ask- why hadn't she just been content with what she had? Why did she have to mess around with magic to get more? Wasn't the money they had and their lifestyle and him enough for her?- but she wasn't there to answer those questions. Not anymore.

Not for a while.

Adrien headed home and, for the first time since his trip to the hospital, responded to Nino's texts himself. Plagg had clearly gone through his phone already so that all of the texts and calls from his friends and classmates were listed as seen and weren't staring Adrien in the face and overwhelming him when he opened his messages. Nino's response was immediate, even though he was meant to be in the middle of class.

"I bet he's had his phone out all day and none of the teachers are going to say anything about it," Plagg told Adrien when he said as much. "I mean, the news broke pretty fast, didn't it? They know what happened."

"Yeah." Adrien didn't know how, exactly- he had thought that it was policy for the family to make a statement when a famous person died, but maybe not. Or maybe it was pretty obvious at the scene that his father wasn't going to make it, or- he didn't know. A buzz from his phone caught Adrien's attention, and he looked down to see another message from Nino. "He wants to know if I'd be interested in having him and Alya and Marinette come over after school, either just to hang out or so I can catch up on school stuff."

Plagg considered him. "Are you ready to see them?"

Adrien didn't even have to think about it. "Honestly? No. Not- not yet. I mean, it would be a distraction, maybe, but- I mean, the teachers have sent me my assignments, I've seen the emails. I can work on that as a distraction on my own."

"Are you worried that they might decide to talk about the superheroes as a distraction and that would be hard?"

Adrien had been about to say no, when he gave it a second thought and- yeah, that was part of it. He needed another day's distance before he could handle that kind of conversation without being worried about giving something away. "Something like that. Alya's going to talk about nothing but Hawkmoth when Ladybug does her announcement, whenever she does it."

Plagg made a face. "You need less obsessed friends."

"It was funny to listen to before I found out about Father." Adrien tucked Plagg into his jacket as he headed for the subway. "And I'm sure it'll be similar in the future, once I have some distance. But I'll be able to handle it tomorrow, I'm sure of it."

oi @staff why’d you get rid of the page break line

"Dude, we've been so worried!"

Adrien managed a smile as he let Nino and Alya in. Marinette was nowhere in sight, which meant that either she had overslept or she had been roped into either helping at the bakery or doing something else. "Hi, you guys."

"We were really sorry to hear what happened," Alya said more formally as Nino gave Adrien a hug. "It's just so- so unexpected."

"That's one way to put it," Adrien agreed with a tight smile. "Unexpected." He glanced between the two of them as Nino stepped back. "Is- uh, is Marinette coming?"

"She's running late," Alya said at once. "She was practicing some sort of speech in her room when I stopped by to get her and wanted to finish her run-through all the way before coming over."

Nino frowned, glancing over at Alya. "A speech? Is it- is it about what I think it is? Because it's really not the time."

Alya only shrugged, not elaborating at all. Adrien frowned as he glanced between her and Nino, sensing that there was something there that he wasn't being told. "I don't know. I didn't catch any words before she heard me coming and stopped. Maybe it's something for the class president thing. She did say that she was coming, though, and to just start without her."

Adrien couldn't help but slump. He had rather been looking forward to getting a Marinette hug right away. She hugged with her whole body, just like Ladybug did, and it was the best.

At least she was coming eventually. He would get his Marinette hug soon enough.

The three of them headed up to Adrien's bedroom. He had been sure to put away everything of his father's in the safe before they came, just in case, and so all that was out was the printed-out assignments that his teachers had sent. Adrien had finished up a lot already on his own- his Literature assignments were easy to bang out, and Philosophy was easy enough considering that he had been sent lecture notes as well. There were a couple other classes that had just had readings to complete and lecture notes to review (Plagg had helped Adrien actually absorb the information by stealing the lecture notes from him and reading them off like a professor so that Adrien didn't just absently skim over all the notes without taking anything in; while Adrien had been more than a little skeptical about the strategy at first, he had to admit that having to actually take his own notes like normal helped.). With the end of the year and exams coming up soon, though, it was still important to be studying everything and making sure that he understood it.

(His father had the worst timing in the world, honestly.)

Marinette arrived twenty minutes later, flushed from running and carrying a bag with both pastries and leftovers from her parents. She immediately wrapped Adrien up in a hug, and he practically melted into the embrace.

(Seriously, she gave the best hugs. Well, with the possible exception of Ladybug.)

"I lost track of time," Marinette told him as they headed back to his room. "I was practicing a thing and I wanted to get it right and memorize it while I was on a roll, and I didn't realize how much time was passing."

"No worries," Adrien said, wrapping his arm around hers. "I'm just glad you could make it. That way I have someone to talk to when Nino and Alya start making eyes at each other."

Or, as it turned out fifteen minutes later, when Nino and Alya got bored of discussing their science unit and brought up the topic of Hawkmoth and the lack of akumatizations lately.

"It's been, what, a week and a half?" Alya said, and it took Adrien a second to figure out what she was talking about. When he did, he stiffened. "I know he's gone for stretches without akumatizing anyone before, but it's always strange- he must be planning something. That's always what he's doing when he goes silent."

Adrien had to think about it, and- actually, Alya was right. Even though his father had only died several days before, he hadn't akumatized anyone for a week before that. He probably hadn't been plotting anything big, though. There had been a bunch of meetings with investors lately, some out of the city, and that meant that his father couldn't slip away. It had been a welcome break in akuma-fighting, and Adrien had taken full advantage of it to study as much as he could before the next wave of akumas inevitably showed up.

Well. Not so inevitable anymore.

"Yeah, I kind of hate it when more than a few days pass by without any akuma," Nino agreed at once, and Adrien tried his best not to listen. He had told Plagg that he would be fine with hearing talk about Hawkmoth, really, but that- that clearly wasn't the case yet. He wondered what it would be like once the news broke that Hawkmoth was dead. Everyone would be talking about it then, and he wouldn't be able to escape. Adrien would skip school to keep away from it, but he couldn't avoid the conversation forever.

"Oh, no kidding. I mean, evil planning aside, there's so much less traffic on the Ladyblog when there aren't any akumas-"

"Adrien, I'm on the same problem that you're on, and I'm stuck. Do you want to work through it together? I thought I might read that section in the book and see if it gives me any ideas."

Adrien startled, glancing over at Marinette. She had moved closer to him when he wasn't paying attention, and now was sitting at his elbow, open science book in front of her. One look at her expression told Adrien that she had caught on that Alya and Nino's discussion was making him uncomfortable (actually, it was making him sick to his stomach- Alya thought not having akuma attacks was inconvenient because they were good for her blog and that- that just didn't sit well with him, not when so much of his life had been interrupted and uprooted thanks to Hawkmoth) and she was trying to distract him. The effort was very much appreciated, especially considering that Nino and Alya clearly weren't going to drop their topic any time soon.

In the end, his friends only stayed for two hours before having to leave. Alya had babysitting duty, apparently, and Nino had promised to help her. Marinette hung back, turning to Adrien once their friends had vanished out the door.

"My parents wanted me to let you know that you're welcome to come stay with us for a bit if you want to get out of this house," Marinette told him. "If it feels too empty or has too many memories, or- whatever, really. We have a guest room that you could use, so you could have your own space."

Adrien blinked, blown away by the offer. It went above and beyond, really. "I- thank you, so much. I'll consider it, I promise, I just- right now-"

"Don't feel like you need to make any sort of decision right away," Marinette said at once, resting one hand on his arm. "We just want you to know that you have the option there, in case you decide that you want it. And if you ever want company, either to talk to or to just be in the same room so it's not so empty- seriously, just call me or come on over. Our door is open for you."

Adrien could only wrap Marinette up in a grateful hug, at a complete loss for words.

staff are dumb for getting rid of the page break line pass it on

On Sunday afternoon, Ladybug called a press conference. For the first time ever, she showed up alone at the mayor's podium.

Adrien watched from at home, so thankful that his partner had assured him that she could handle it alone. Even though he was feeling better- even though he was coming to terms with, well, everything- he didn't trust himself in front of a microphone and dozens of cameras yet.

"She doesn't look nervous at all," Plagg commented as he settled down on the back of Adrien's couch to watch. On screen, Ladybug was clearly exchanging some small talk with the mayor while they waited for all of the reporters to settle. Based on the mayor's usual expression, she hadn't broken the news to him yet, either. "I bet she is, though, and she's just gotten good at hiding it."

"She's gotten really good at public speaking," Adrien agreed, leaning forward as Ladybug turned her attention back to the podium, smoothing out a piece of paper there as though they were about to start. He caught sight of the mayor trying to glance over her shoulder to see what the conference was about, but it was obvious that Ladybug's hands were covering the paper enough that he couldn't make things out. "I can just barely hear another reporter talking near Madam Chamack. It sounds like they're thinking that something happened to me."

Plagg yawned widely. "Yeah, it's one of those gossip reporters, and they think that you died and that's why Ladybug is there alone."

"If I had, Ladybug would have picked out a new partner before making any announcements. They probably would have been out for a fight first, too. No point in exposing weaknesses like that." On screen, things settled down. "Oh, it's starting."

"Thank you for coming today," Ladybug started confidently, straightening and glancing around the audience. "I know that this is last minute, but Chat Noir and I have some news that we wanted to share with you. He's not able to make it today because he had a civilian obligation that he couldn't get out of, but he didn't want it to delay our announcement." Ladybug paused to take a breath, and then she looked out at the audience, chin high and confident. "Because Hawkmoth is gone. Paris is safe."

The room exploded. Ladybug waited patiently for the fuss to die down, her expression giving nothing away even as reporters shouted questions in her direction. Her quirked brow told them that they had to wait for their questions, though, and they settled quickly enough.

"There was no final battle, as I'm sure you noticed," Ladybug continued once the room had quieted to her liking, her voice even and calm. "Hawkmoth died suddenly of reasons unrelated to his misuse of the Butterfly Miraculous, and his remaining family found the Miraculous among his possessions following his death. They brought the Miraculous to Chat Noir and I so that we would know and could return the Miraculous to their proper spot. We talked to both them and Hawkmoth's former kwami and there are no other willing accomplices still alive."

Adrien made a small face at that. It wasn't strictly true, even ignoring Nathalie's only somewhat less-than-entirely-willing involvement. He had found a note in one of his father's journals that Lila Rossi had willingly worked with him or at least had had some sort of informal agreement with Hawkmoth about causing more akumas and becoming one on a regular basis, but Lila had been exposed as a liar and had left the country in disgrace with her mom over a year ago. Dragging her back into things- at least publically, neither he nor Ladybug had ruled out reaching out to her mom and administering punishment that way- would just complicate the whole situation.

Plagg cackled. "Oh, Ladybug is slick. She's not mentioning the Peacock at all, or giving away that there was more than one Miraculous recovered. She could be a politician like that, not lying exactly but not reminding the public about Mayura."

"It'll help that the Peacock hasn't come into play recently," Adrien said absently, watching as Ladybug made a few more quick remarks to assure the public that they had investigated properly. "She hadn't come out for more than a month when we fought the last akuma. And like Alya said, even that was a week and a half ago. More, now."

"I thank Hawkmoth's family for their bravery in coming forward to us with the Miraculous," Ladybug continued onscreen, her voice rising just a hair to be heard over the grumble that was starting to fill the room. "And we send them our best wishes that they can heal from the death and the discovery."

"But who was Hawkmoth?" one reporter yelled out at once. "You haven't told us yet!"

Ladybug's expression was flat as she answered, leaning a little closer to the microphone so she would be picked up. "That is staying confidential information. He is gone, and-"

"The public has a right to know!"

"Yeah, and the police should interrogate the family!"

"He is gone, and releasing his name would only punish his family," Ladybug repeated, her voice louder. "And they are innocent, Chat Noir and I already investigated. They knew nothing about his supervillain activities."

Madam Chamack scoffed, her voice coming across loud and clear. "And we're supposed to believe that Hawkmoth's family didn't suspect anything? That's ridiculous. They lived with him, they must have-"

Ladybug's stare- a stare almost bordering on a glare- was piercing. "I've been a superhero for years and so has Chat Noir. Our friends and family have suspected nothing. If people aren't expecting it, it's easy enough to hide."

"Paris deserves to know who tormented her for years-"

"Paris does know: it was Hawkmoth."

"But-"

Ladybug was doing a good job of hiding the irritation on her face. Adrien suspected that she knew that this was coming. "You all want to know who Hawkmoth was out of curiosity. That's understandable. But you would get a name, a face behind the mask, and then you wouldn't care anymore. In a week or a month, you would move on and having the name out there wouldn't matter to you. But if Hawkmoth's name got out, I have no doubt that his family would face all sorts of backlash and be targeted by no fault of their own, and I refuse to have innocent civilians targeted just because people were curious. End. Of. Discussion."

There was a discontented murmur at that, one that made Adrien frown in concern. Ladybug might be Paris' darling, but public opinion could change really fast.

"Plagg, are you charged up?" Adrien asked, leaning forward to keep a close eye on the screen. "If people get any more riled up, I might move over to the City Hall area so that Ladybug has backup nearby."

Plagg swallowed half of a wedge of Camembert in one bite. "On it, kid."

"Will you be doing an identity reveal now that the danger is gone?" another reporter called out as Adrien transformed, apparently having sensed that Ladybug wasn't going to budge on her position. "We would love to know who's been protecting us all of these years!"

This time, Ladybug actually did frown. "A identity reveal to each other, perhaps. To Paris? No. There will always be people out there in search of power, and there's no point in making it easy for them to find it."

"Can you comment on your relationship with Chat Noir? You both have been seen out and about lately looking very close-"

Chat Noir headed out the window (carefully, of course), jumping over several rooftops before he had the time to pull out his earpiece and tune it in to the news so that he could follow along. Ladybug was dismissing more claims of the two of them being in a relationship, pointing out that they had been friends and partners for years and of course they were close. The real reason that they had been so cuddly over the past couple days was, of course, because she had been comforting him and her hugs were amazing, but they couldn't say that unless they wanted to give away the fact that Hawkmoth had been Chat Noir's father.

And just in case it ever came out that Hawkmoth had been Mr. Agreste, if anyone ever managed to work that out on their own or even suspect it- yeah, they didn't want to give his identity away.

The press conference ended without any incident just as Chat Noir reached City Hall. He landed on a rooftop nearby, out of sight as reporters started to file out. There was no sign of Ladybug yet- no doubt she was taking a back exit and then heading to the rooftops so that no one could bother her- so he settled in to wait for her, thinking about the news conference.

Ladybug had done really, really well. She hadn't flinched at the barrage of questions at all and hadn't even looked down at what had to be her prepared sheet of remarks. Clearly she had memorized the entire thing. While she had said that Hawkmoth had died suddenly, she hadn't specified that it was in a car accident, and her wording hadn't given away that there was just one family member left, even though Chat Noir knew that he had mentioned that it was just him and his father at some point. She was making it as hard as possible for people to figure out who Hawkmoth had been, while giving out just enough information to make it seem like she wasn't hiding more than necessary.

Of course, she didn't know who Hawkmoth was, either. Chat Noir had offered to tell her, since she was his partner and deserved to know more than anyone else, but she had told him not to feel obligated to reveal himself if he wasn't entirely ready yet. Since there weren't going to be any more threats from Hawkmoth, it wasn't necessary for her to know.

He was thankful for that, actually. After his secret identity had been secret for so long, just up and sharing it all of a sudden would have been a shock. He needed some things to stay the same.

"Chat Noir! I wasn't expecting to see you out and about right now!"

Chat Noir grinned as Ladybug dropped down next to him. "Oh, you know me. I just can't stay away. And I was worried," he added when she rolled her eyes at him in fond exasperation. "The reporters seemed to be really upset about you not telling them anything, and I wanted to be close by in case anyone tried anything. I was listening in," he added, tapping at his earpiece and turning it down at the same time. Madam Chamack was saying something about the press conference, but he didn't bother to listen too closely. He could look it up later and see what Paris' attitude was towards the news. "And if anything happened..."

"My protective bodyguard," Ladybug said fondly, giving him a warm hug. "I was ready to bolt out of there at a moment's notice. Before the conference even started, I mapped out all of the things in the room that I could latch my yo-yo to in case I had to get off of the ground."

"You're always so prepared." Chat Noir let himself lean into her side. "And I know that you can defend yourself, but I just- part of me still felt like I should have been there."

"Mm-hmm." Ladybug rested her head against his shoulder. "That's not the last that we'll hear of it, I'm sure. There were not a lot of happy faces in that room when I left. I'd say that we'll probably have reporters harassing us about Hawkmoth's identity for a while."

She sounded tired. Chat Noir felt bad for her. Ladybug was no doubt planning on shielding him from the worst of the inquiries, which wasn't fair on her. She was studying for her final exams, just like him, and she no doubt had other things going on in her civilian life that needed her time and energy.

"But if we stay on the rooftops and only tell them that we've already said all that we're going to at today's press conference, they should give up eventually," Ladybug continued. "It's just curiosity. They'll find something else to take up their attention."

"I hope so, Bug," Chat Noir said, peering over the side of the rooftop just enough to see the hordes of reporters still down below, each talking eagerly to a camera. "I really, really hope so."

oi staff where’s the page break line

The talk of the school was Hawkmoth's death and Ladybug's refusal to tell Paris who he was. Oddly enough, Chat Noir's absence at the press conference and what it might mean was also a popular subject.

No one had guessed the truth. Instead, they thought that Chat Noir had disagreed with Ladybug about releasing Hawkmoth's name and that they had fallen out, maybe, and Ladybug had decided to do the conference by herself so that Chat Noir wouldn't act out behind her.

That- that was worse than the truth, actually. Ladybug had just been helping him by doing the conference by herself, and this was her reward.

Alya was talking about the conference when Adrien entered homeroom, her voice animated as she held most of the class's interest. She was firmly on the side of revealing Hawkmoth's identity, which Adrien had known before he even came in. The Ladyblog had had a very upset article about Ladybug's refusal to tell the public, one that he had just skimmed before exiting the page.

"Maybe the superheroes aren't going to say anything, but his identity can't stay secret forever," Alya was saying as Adrien slipped past her to sit next to Marinette instead of in his normal seat in the front row, which Alya had taken. "I've been trying to figure out who it might be, looking through obituaries for people who 'died unexpectedly', but there are a lot of people in Paris and a lot of deaths and the obits don't always specify in Paris versus out of Paris, and it's been almost two weeks since the last akuma attack. There's no way to tell when during that he died. And he might have died during that akuma battle, too, from a heart attack or something. It was impossible to tell what was going on on his end of things unless he actually came out."

"And Hawkmoth's family might have not given the superheroes the full story," Nino chimed in. "He might had been ill and that's why he wanted to use the Miraculous to- to cure it somehow. Like, it could have been anyone."

Alya groaned. "Oh, that would be the worst! How am I supposed to figure out who Hawkmoth was if they've given us misleading information? That's not fair!"

Adrien's eyes flashed to Alya. Once again, all she cared about was the scoop, and it made him a little ill. She was one of his friends. If she actually managed to figure out who Hawkmoth had been, would she care that she knew him and keep it secret for his sake? Or would she post it anyway?

"There's a petition about that, actually- I just saw it this morning and linked it to the Ladyblog, and it's gotten so many signatures already!" Alya was grinning again. "It's to make Ladybug and Chat Noir release the information about who Hawkmoth was. They're so close to hitting their target goal, too!"

Adrien's stomach dropped.

"Oh, that's great!"

"Cool!"

"Lemme find the link, I want to sign it now-"

"No petition is going to be able to make Ladybug and Chat Noir release anything."

The chatter around Alya stopped immediately and everyone turned to look at Marinette, who looked less than happy with them. Her arms were crossed across her chest and she was glaring. "Petitions are a show of support for a cause, not something legally binding. And even if the mayor tried something- the Miraculous are Ladybug and Chat Noir's jurisdiction, not the police's or anybody else's. No one can make them release any information, nor should they. If Ladybug said not to worry about who Hawkmoth was and to leave it alone, then you should leave it alone."

Several people exchanged uncertain looks, taking a step back away from Alya.

Alya crossed her arms right back. "Uh-huh, and what about the right of the people to know? Hawkmoth possessed a ton of people across the city."

"He's dead. It's not like it's going to make any difference to him. It's not like he's escaping a punishment or anything."

"I think there's something fishy there," Alya countered at once. "I bet the family knew about Hawkmoth, but they decided to hand over the Miraculous in return for anonymity and getting away scot-free."

"That's ridiculous."

"Why else would Ladybug and Chat Noir keep their secret, hmm?" Alya challenged. "If Hawkmoth's family isn't guilty- if they honestly didn't know- then the police can decide that and let the public know."

Marinette's scowl was fierce, and Adrien was very, very glad that he wasn't on the receiving end of it. "I think that this whole push for the reveal is just trashy tabloid interest. Look at you- you're ignoring real-world consequences in your search for a scoop! How would it be worth destroying a family's life over a scoop for something that someone dead did?"

Adrien blinked, somewhat taken aback by Marinette's tone. The whole fight had escalated really quickly, especially considering that Alya and Marinette were friends.

"They got into a big fight about this last night," Nino whispered in Adrien's ear, making him startle. "After Alya posted about the press conference on the Ladyblog. Marinette is firmly on Ladybug's side. Alya... is not."

"Trashy? You're calling the Ladyblog trashy?"

"If you've decided that a scoop for it is more important than actual human beings, then yeah!"

"Actual human beings who got akumatized want answers and they deserve them!"

Marinette rolled her eyes at that. "Uh-huh. Just this weekend, you were complaining because there hadn't been any akuma attacks lately and that meant that traffic on the Ladyblog was slower than usual. Where was the concern for the akuma victims then, huh?"

Alya spluttered, going red. "I- no, that was just a general observation-"

"And in the Ladyblog's first year, you wanted to expose Ladybug and Chat Noir's identities, never mind the consequences that would have!" Marinette countered. "You're just all about the scoop, forget the consequences to other people as long as you get your hits!"

"The public has a right-"

"And I think that that is just a weak excuse for you to hide behind instead of admitting that this whole search for Hawkmoth's identity is selfish!"

"Okay, class, to your seats!" their teacher called before Alya could respond. "Class is starting now, settle down!"

Much to Adrien's relief, that was the end of the fight, at least for the time being. Alya kept her back to Marinette, who looked like she couldn't care less. Neither of them spoke to the other for the rest of the day, which meant that Adrien got to be Marinette's seatmate for the entire day.

That was really good, actually. Marinette was a quiet, supportive presence, there without being overwhelmingly smothering or anything. Best of all, she understood the importance of just sitting there in a quiet hug.

"If I ever tell any of my normal friends about Father, it's going to be Marinette that I tell," Adrien told Plagg over lunch. "Not anybody else. Nino is dating Alya and I can't trust that he won't for sure ever not say anything about it, and Alya is an obvious no. Marinette might be best friends with Alya, but she wouldn't say anything, I know it. This isn't the first time that she's had issues with the way Alya was reporting things."

Plagg sniffed. "As is only right. Reporter girl's not got a firm handle on reporting ethics yet, or the ability to take a step back and see beyond the immediate effects of certain information going public."

Adrien nodded. He had hoped that the journalism camp that Alya had gone to the previous summer would have helped curb that particular tendency of hers, but apparently there was no such luck. Or maybe this was just too big of a potential scoop for her to really think ahead that far.

That afternoon came with a request from the police department that the superheroes tell them who Hawkmoth had been, so that they could interview the people close to him themselves to check for any potential collaborators. This time, Chat Noir accompanied Ladybug as she headed over to police headquarters to-

Well, to tell them to shove off, essentially. After all, she had already said that she and Chat Noir had looked for collaborators and come up with no one who had been a fully willing helper. The Miraculous were their jurisdiction, and they took care of the investigation. End of story.

None of the police officers looked very happy when they left. And none of the reporters who had crowded in around the station looked particularly thrilled with the brisk brush-off that the superheroes gave them when they shouted questions about Hawkmoth's identity and how all of Paris wanted to know and how there were petitions, so obviously they should be sharing-

Ladybug looked like she was considering throttling someone as they shot away from the knot of microphones and cameras.

"How are you holding up, kitty?" she asked as the two of them headed across the city, faster than cars could chase them. "I'm sure it's not easy, since Hawkmoth has kind of been the topic of the day. It's practically all I heard about all day, it seemed."

"It's hard," Chat Noir admitted. "Especially because everyone is making such a big deal about not knowing his identity. I'm lucky that I have a friend who understand the why and she called out people who were making a big stink about it. So then people were kind of avoiding us with that conversation, which helped."

Ladybug looked pleased. "I like your friend already."

Chat Noir couldn't hide his grin. He definitely wanted to introduce Ladybug and Marinette sometime. He was sure that they would get along well. "She's very likeable. Also scary when she wants to be. I couldn't believe it when people kept arguing with her. I mean, she's kinda the same size you are, but I wouldn't want to cross her, either."

The smug look on Ladybug's face made him laugh.

The two of them tried to curl up on a secluded rooftop together to hang out (and maybe get some homework done- after spending two days not being remotely productive, he needed to get back on top of things), but no matter where they went, people spotted them and started shouting questions at them. Soon enough, they spotted a news helicopter lifting off across the city and decided to each head their separate ways for the time being before the helicopter started trying to follow them home.

It was frustrating, Chat Noir reflected as he dropped back down into his room and detransformed. He needed his Ladybug time right now, because aside from Plagg, she was the only person who knew all that he was going through. Maybe they didn't just talk about his feelings- because that wasn't going to help, just lingering over what was making him feel bad- but she understood if he suddenly went quiet when they were chatting about something, or if he cuddled up to her side in search of a wordless hug. If the public and the press didn't let up soon, it could become dangerous for the two of them to transform and meet up. If people tried to track their trips home...

They would figure him out in a heartbeat, and it wouldn't be long before someone pieced together that Hawkmoth was his father.

#Miraculous Ladybug #My writing #crash and burn #adrien agreste #sorry for the delay life happened

78 notes · View notes

fresh-outta-jams · 6 years ago

Text

Signed, Sealed, Delivered - Part 12

Namjoon x Reader Author: Admin Mo Summary: You’re in college when your soulmate tattoo shows up, an address. You figure it couldn’t hurt to send a letter, right? Note: I’m so excitedddddddd oof here we go, y’all. Warnings: Some swears, soulmate fluff. Word Count: 3.5k

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, Epilogue

Nervous didn’t even begin to cover the emotions coursing through Namjoon’s body. He was terrified, excited, elated to be getting on the plane, and as soon as he sat down, it all sank in. The next time he got out of this plane, he would be in your state, and then soon after, in a car on the way to your school, and then even sooner after that, he’d have you in his arms, smothering you with kisses and affection. God, it was almost enough to make him pass out.

It had been a while since he’d flown somewhere alone, Namjoon reminisced. He missed the chatter and laughter of his brothers, filling the plane. Instead, sitting in First Class alone, he had to turn to his phone and computer for entertainment. He’d told you a few hours ago that he’d broken his phone, another lie, and that he wouldn’t have it for the rest of the day until it got fixed, so the two of you wouldn’t be able to FaceTime. And, if the problem arose, he’d lie to you about his webcam being dysfunctional too. It was a fourteen-hour flight and you couldn’t have any idea he was on the way, if he wanted the surprise to pay off.

Lily and Grace had offered to keep an eye on you, making sure you stayed at the library, which was where he planned to meet up with them, and therefore, you, when the time came. God, thinking about it made his heart race.

After this flight, he’d be with you. After this flight...He’d. Be. With. You. It was going to drive him mad. Figuring his best bet to pass the time was sleeping, Namjoon lowered his seat and pulled his Koya sleeping mask down over his eyes, his headphones playing something soft and romantic. He had no idea how he would ever be able to sleep when something so exciting was waiting on the other end of that dreamy tunnel for him, but he figured he’d have to if he didn’t want the minutes to crawl by.

So, he let his breaths slow, and he let the music carry him off to a happy place filled with coffee shops and a girl with pink hair and a camera.

***

You were decidedly itchy. No, maybe itchy wasn’t quite the right word. You were antsy, more like it. It was seven. You’d just woken up from a very odd dream about an airplane, which you’d written off as anxiety about your upcoming first flight.

Today was Monday, the first day of exam week, which certainly contributed to your itchiness. And once you unlocked your phone to scroll through the night’s notifications, you got some more answers as to exactly why something felt off.

Unknown Number: Hey jagiya! It’s Namjoon! Your clumsy boyfriend dropped his phone, so I won’t be able to text or call you today. I’m sending this from Hobi’s phone. I just wanted to let you know that I love you so much and I’ll talk to you tomorrow! Have a good day studying for your exams. I know you’ll do well! Fighting!

It was sweet, very sweet. How thoughtful of him, to send you a message instead of leaving you to wonder if your amazing wonderful boyfriend was ignoring you. But that was what Namjoon was: thoughtful. And yet, something still felt off about it, yet you couldn’t put your finger on it.

So, you sat up, stretched, hung your sleeping mask on its designated Command hook, and started down your ladder to begin one very uneventful day of studying.

***

You were a strong believer in study breaks. Cramming without stop always made you more frustrated than anything else. So, every couple of hours, you took a thirty-minute break to talk to the other two friends who had come to cram with you. Well, at the moment, it was one. Lily was taking her Psychology exam, so that left you with Grace, who had her nose in her American History book, jotting notes down in her red, white, and blue notebook.

When she looked up, and caught your gaze, she set down her textbook and smiled, stretching. “Break time already?”

“Yeah, it’s like three.”

“Holy shit that went by fast.” She checked the time on her phone only to find that what you’d told her was accurate. And also, she’d received a DM from your soulmate, the one person you could not know she was messaging. She snatched up her phone as quickly as she could.

Your eyes narrowed suspiciously, that sinking feeling you’d been harboring since this morning returning in full force. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing!” She blurted too quickly, clearing out her notifications, and with them, any remains of Namjoon’s message. “No, I just, uh, my professor emailed me a study guide and I really needed it.”

“Oh, that’s good…” You nodded, attempting to take a sip from your now-empty glass of tea. Luckily for you, you’d been saving up your meal dollars, so you had enough money for all the tea you could ever drink...and then some. And, in addition, you had to spend all of them before the school year ended, so you figured you may as well use them.

Standing up from the table, you grabbed your empty cup and tossed it in the trash, walking up the stairs to get another one from the tea place on the second floor. While you were gone, Grace unlocked her phone and opened Twitter. It was Namjoon, of course, messaging in the group chat he’d started with Grace and Lily.

RM_fan_94: Around five or six hours left on my flight. How are things going? Is she okay?

GracieGirl: She’s fine, Namjoon. She has consumed around six cups of tea since we’ve been here, tho. Your girl has a problem…

RM_fan_94: She sounds like me with coffee haha

RM_fan_94: Do either of you have tips for when I get there?

GracieGirl: I’m going to send you navigation from the entrance of the school to the library, but besides that, it should be fine. We’re sitting in this little area on the bottom floor.

GracieGirl: It’s her favorite spot, so there’s no way we’re moving.

GracieGirl: Plus, this place is full bc of exams, so we couldn’t really move if we tried.

GracieGirl: Once you get here, go through the door on the front of the building (facing the giant bird statue) and go down the stairs. It’s basically impossible to miss her. She has hot pink hair.

GracieGirl: Also, she’s wearing a BTS shirt.

RM_fan_94: Awwwwww that’s my girl.

Lilyyyy: Exam is FINISHED!! Operation Babysit (Y/N) Commences!

RM_fan_94: I hope you did well!

Lilyyyy: Omg where did she find you? You’re so perfect?? And sweet?? Did she make you in a lab??

RM_fan_94: Probably haha omg. But no, after many debates over the topic, I’ve concluded that she is the perfect one in this relationship. I’m just her hype man.

GracieGirl: Oooookay, Mr. Superstar, whatever you say.

Lilyyyy: Y’all are cute as fuck. I can’t wait for tonight!!!

Namjoon paused for a while before he typed out his next message, sighing to himself as he laid his head back against the seat again.

RM_fan_94: Me either…

***

You sat at the table, drilling film terms until your head started buzzing.You had watched your project so many times, you couldn’t stare at the editing program for another second, or you were sure you would go insane. So, instead, you were studying for your Film Analysis class, reteaching yourself about motifs and mise-en-scene and all of the other terms from the beginning of the semester that had been buried by all of the new things you’d learned thus far.

You still felt itchy. Maybe moreso now than when you had woken up, but itchy nonetheless. It was an odd feeling, like something was hanging over your head, something real and heavy and dropping fast. And yet, the more you thought about it, the less it made sense. Nothing was happening. You were fine. Everything was fine. It was just stress. Yes, of course, that’s what it was. Stress. Logical.

The only thing hanging over your head was your exams and the upcoming flight to Korea. That’s all it was, and it made perfect sense.

You sighed and checked the time on your phone. It was six, and you were hungry. You’d had a muffin for brunch and nothing since then. Time for a break, then. You got up and both Grace and Lily looked, wide-eyed.

“Where are you going?” Lily blurted when she saw you grab your keys.

“I’m hungry.”

“Oh. Gotcha. I’ll come with.” Lily offered, picking up her keys too. “If we take the tunnels, we don’t even have to go outside.”

“That is a good point.” You agreed, waving to Grace, the appointed guardian of your things for the time-being, seeing as she had grabbed food thirty minutes ago while you and Lily were busy working.

The two of you walked through the library and through the tunnels that connected the learning center to the building next to it, where there was a selection of fast food places. You got in line at the sandwich place and scrolled through Twitter, your thumb moving to send something funny to Namjoon until you remembered, stopping in place, that Namjoon’s phone was broken.

Your heart sank a little, but you saved the link so you could send it to him later.

“You okay?” Lily nudged your arm and you nodded. “Something wrong?”

“Namjoon broke his phone, so I can’t talk to him…” You sighed. “But I’m glad he told me. Is it weird I miss him? Also, I’m itchy.”

“You’re...itchy?” Lily giggled. “You might want to get a cream for that, sweetie, I don’t know what else to tell you.”

“I know, it’s weird.” You agreed, laughing with her. “I don’t know. I guess it’s just nerves from...everything, you know?”

“Yeah, I think I kind of get that.” Lily nodded. It was a good thing you were busy with your phone or you definitely would have noticed the knowing smile blooming across her features. If only you knew what was in store for you in two short hours…

***

When Namjoon got off the plane, he was shaking. Every part of him, trembling in anticipation. He fumbled with his suitcase, struggling to get it out of the luggage check without dropping it. His heart raced. He was here, like twenty minutes from your school, and as soon as his Uber texted him, he’d be on his way.

Namjoon reached into his pocket to check the time. It was around eight, so according to your friends, you’d still be in the library by now, but he figured he’d better send a heads-up just in case. His fingers were shaking almost too much to punch in the message, but somehow, he managed, pressing send after reading over it once or twice.

RM_fan_94: Just landed. Uber should be here soon. I’ll be there twenty minutes after that. Keep her busy.

His face was flushed, heart pounding, banging against his ribcage in hopes to escape and run down the street to find you. God, you were so close. You two had never been this close. There had almost always been an ocean between you, at least, since you’d started communicating. And now, all that was standing in his way was a car ride. Namjoon almost couldn’t stand it.

So, nervous as all hell, Namjoon started pacing in the lobby of the airport until he finally got the notification and went sprinting for the front doors and into the van of his Uber driver.

Every atom in his body was buzzing, buzzing, buzzing and burning as he got closer and closer to the gates of your college. He read the signs on the side of the road. Twenty miles turned to ten, which turned to five. Namjoon felt dizzy, suffocated by his rapidly-approaching destiny. He was sprinting towards it, now, a handful of miles standing between him and the love of his life.

In the passing streetlights, Namjoon could make out the lettering on his wrist. The tattoo that had started this all. He remembered his excitement the moment his fingers brushed against your first letter and the words tingled into existence on his skin. He remembered when all he had to go on was a name and the fact that you were from the States. He remembered the overwhelming joy that washed over him when you sent him the first picture of you, dressed up as Wonder Woman and smiling like you didn’t have a care in the world. He remembered your first phone call, the way his veins pulsed when he finally heard your voice.

All of it was coming to a peak, now. The precipice. This was the beginning of something very new, something uncharted for himself and the rest of the members in BTS.

Without warning, his Uber driver reached the traffic light to turn onto campus. It flicked from red to green, and he drove across the halted lanes of opposite traffic, under the giant arch that marked the beginning of your school. This was it. There was no going back now.

***

Something was wrong with Lily and Grace. They were acting weird. Both of them had gotten a notification from some mysterious group chat, and now neither of them could look you in the eye. It was odd, to say the very least.

“Everything okay?”

“Yep! Just peachy!” Grace lied through her teeth, beaming at you innocently. Something very, very strange was afoot, but you were too burned-out to attempt to get to the bottom of it.

So, seeing as your drink was empty once again, you stood up and began the trek to the tea store up the stairs.

“Where are you going?” Lily asked, almost shooting up out of her seat.

“I need more tea.” You shrugged, looking from Lily to Grace. “I’ll be back in like five minutes tops.”

“Okay.” Lily nodded, walking to the bathroom to cover up the fact that she’d shot up so fast to attempt to stop you.

Shaking your head at the strange behavior, you finished walking up the steps and stood in line at the tea store, ordering yet another iced drink. By this time, the barista didn’t even need to ask. It only took him a few minutes to get your drink to you and then you were on your way back down the stairs to the table. You were sitting down when your phone rang with a call...from Namjoon. Your eyebrows furrowed until you realized it was like ten in the morning in Korea, so his phone must have gotten fixed.

Brightening immediately, you picked up.

“Hey babe! Did you get your phone fixed?”

“I did…” His voice sounded weird. You could hear his tone and his breath shaking with each word. “Good thing, too…”

“Joon, is everything okay?”

“Great, baby, everything is great. Super, super great. I just...God…” And then he hung up, his connection cutting out, assumably. Your eyebrows furrowed, waiting for him to call back, like he usually did when your Skype calls cut out, but he didn’t.

“Something wrong?” Lily asked, almost unable to hide the grin on her face. Grace subtly held her phone, obviously recording. She had been since you got back with your tea. And yet, your head was buzzing too much for you to notice.

“I think his phone cut out.” You said softly, staring at the screen as you contemplated calling him back. You waited for a few more seconds before you noticed someone standing at the bottom of the steps. He was tall, his long frame dressed in an oversized black shirt and ripped jeans, tufts of pink hair sticking down out of his black baseball cap.

Maybe it was the pink hair that caused you to look back down at your work for a split second before your heart lurched and you did a double-take. You studied him, frozen and wide-eyed. You urged your legs to get up so you could get a closer look, but they weren’t listening.

You put your hands on the table, pushing yourself to a standing position as Lily and Grace giggled. Your legs wobbled with each slow step over to him. He was frozen, too, an amused grin on his face as he watched the wheels turn in your head, dimples on full display.

“N-Namjoon?” You whispered, tears fogging up your vision. You covered your mouth with your hands, taking a step forward and then a little step back, still unsure if this was actually happening or if it was some cruel hallucination, cooked up by twelve hours of staring at a book and taking notes.

“It’s just me, baby.” He reassured softly. “I’m right here.”

That was all the reassurance you needed. He set down his duffle bag and opened his arms, waiting for your legs to finally get the message from your brain. Eventually, they did, and you broke into a run, closing the distance between you until you were jumping into his arms, legs wrapped tight around his hips. One of his large hands came to rest under your thigh, and the other fastened around your back, rubbing comforting circles as your floodgates finally opened, a cascade of tears following.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” He tried to hush your sobs, but he realized after a few seconds that he was crying too.

“How did you get here?” You croaked. “What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to come surprise my girl.” He chuckled softly, happy tears rolling down his cheeks. “I knew you’d need a little pick-me-up for exam week.”

“So you just came at the drop of a hat?”

“This has been planned for months, baby. It’s all worked out, I promise.” Namjoon was still holding you, your legs firmly gripping his waist, but he pulled away to look at you up close. You were the most beautiful person he’d ever seen, even with trails of black mascara running down your cheeks. “God, you’re so beautiful.”

“I look like a mess.” You shook your head, chuckling at how much of a disaster you probably looked on today of all days. Of course on the one day that mattered, you looked like you’d just been hit by the bus.

“Baby, you’re the most beautiful person on the planet.” Namjoon pressed a long kiss to your forehead, closing his eyes before murmuring, “You look perfect, always. I love you, jagiya.”

“I love you too.” You took a moment there to look at him, to really look at this man who held the other half of your soul in his heart. You raised your hands to his cheeks and gave his dimples a pinch, earning a laugh from him. “You’re real…”

“Weird, isn’t it?” He raised an eyebrow. He couldn’t count how many times he’d heard that from ARMYs all over the world. Although, it was never as tender or careful as this statement.

“Mmhmm.” You hummed, studying his features up close, squishing his dimpled cheeks together. “Joonie?”

“What?”

Your eyes lingered on the pillows of his plush lips. They were calling to you. “I want to kiss you.”

“Then kiss me.” He replied, leaning in slowly to meet you in the middle. It was electric, sparks flying the moment your lips melted against his larger, warmer ones. You almost forgot you were in public until you heard cheers from all of the other brain-dead students flooding the library currently. Blushing, you reluctantly pulled away from Namjoon, finally unwrapping your legs from his hips and settling yourself back on the floor.

“Was it worth the wait?” You whispered, taking his hand and leading him back over to where your grinning friends had pulled up a fourth chair.

“I would wait a hundred years for you if I had to.”

“You’re cheesy.” You scrunched your nose and looked up at him. You knew all along that he would tower over you, but up close it was entirely different. Namjoon seemed to notice too, as he looked down on you gingerly. He leaned forward and pressed another lingering kiss to your forehead, pulling you against his chest.

“So are you.”

“That’s fair.” You giggled into the fabric of his shirt before finally sitting down with him. He couldn’t keep his eyes off of you no matter how hard he tried. But eventually, he did turn to give his thanks to Lily and Grace.

“Thank you, ladies. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“Don’t mention it.” Grace smiled. Lily nodded in agreement.

You, however, looked between the three of them with wide eyes. “You knew???”

“Explains a lot, doesn’t it?” Lily chuckled, shrugging as she got back to her studying.

“Congratulations, you two.” Gace bidded before slipping her headphones back over her ears.

Namjoon took your hand in his own, scooching his chair closer to yours. He studied your little fingers with a smile before bringing your hand to his lips and kissing it. This, he imagined, was what the rest of your little forever looked like, and he wouldn’t have it any other way...

Tagged: @iie-wakarimasen , @ffantasylandd, @jooniefluff, @chimchimsauce, @mrs-saeyoung-choi, @theprinceoftheundead, @angyexoxo, @copenhagenspirit, @lovelylittlekittn, @lilgaga98, @iminlovewjjk, @feed-my-geek-soul, @loveandwitch, @recoveringflowerchild, @demonic-meatball, @maddieisaacs, @scissorsandtonfas, @carirosesg, @backtonormalthings, @local-mochi, @faliwi, @spoopyela, @nanie5, @ingenu--e, @undiscovered1personality, @andalos, @calspixie, @filtermono, @huhuehuey, @mikey-girl12, @lilliaflurr, @hypophrenium, @sitkafay, @spiicyari, @andeerwilson, @btswerewolfaus, @oyasumi7, @mycurrentusernameisalreadytaken, @gangstavixsta

#armyofwriters #kpopwonderlandtag #namjoon #namjoon x reader #namjoon imagine #bts #bts imagine #fluff #soulmate au #bts soulmate au #rm #rm x reader #rm imagine #signed sealed delivered

287 notes · View notes

livehealthynewsusa · 3 years ago

Text

Paul Giamatti on Gunpowder Milkshake, Jungle Cruise, and Billons Season 6

Everyone knows Paul Giamatti from something. Perhaps you are a Howard Stern loyalist who remembers him as “Pig Vomit” from Stern’s 1997 biographical film Private Parts (adapted from Stern’s book and starred as himself). You may remember his little role in Saving Private Ryan or his Oscar-nominated role in Cinderella Man. You may have seen him on the small screen portraying the perfect John Adams on HBO’s John Adams or going on par with Damian Lewis on Showtimes Billions for the past five years.

Personally, I always think of the first movie I’ve ever seen him in: Big Fat Liar, a 2002 family movie in which Giamatti plays a selfish Hollywood producer who literally steals a movie idea from a kid (Frankie Muniz). But the whole point is that everyone has something. He’s one of those actors who makes any movie, show, play, or commercial he’s in better, and the latest to get that Giamatti bump is Netflix’s Gunpowder Milkshake.

The film, which features Guardians of the Galaxy and Jumanji: The Next Level star Karen Gillan in her first butt-kicking lead role, clearly takes a bit of DNA from its spiritual predecessors, John Wick and Kill Bill. But the movie’s wonderfully choreographed action comes non-stop, with fights, sequences, and imagery that you’ll want to see again right away. Gillan and Giamatti are not alone either; while they play assassins or handlers, they are accompanied by Lena Headey, Angela Bassett, Carla Gugino and Michelle Yeoh as a quartet of totally tough killers.

Netflix

As always, Giamatti’s character is complicated. He’s not a good guy, but we’re not entirely sure if he could be called a really bad guy. He can talk a little more about that. His screen time is limited, but as always, it’s the line deliveries, facial expressions, and general lingering memorability of the 54-year-old that make him such a valuable presence.

In addition to talking to Giamatti about his role in Netflix’s new hyper-stylized action film, we also talked about a few other important topics, including one of his decades-old cult classics working with both The Rock and a Majestic Bird, and what projects he can do for tease or not a release later in 2021.

I would fail to start this interview without asking you about the first movie I saw you in as a kid in the 90s: Big fat liar.

For sure.

I am curious to see how often you hear that this person is brought up. I suspect some other people my age, but maybe it doesn’t resonate as much with other or older generations.

It comes out pretty much which is great. I think now, you know, generations of people … you are right about older people, but how old are you?

I am 28.

Um. Yes, people your age and a little older, and their kids are seeing it now, too. So it’s been a success with children for generations. Children still see it. It is great.

Lots of people see you with all that blue paint on you, don’t they?

Yup! Yup.

Giamatti and Frankie Muniz in Big Fat Liar.

Universal

Well, Gunpowder Milkshake is quite a shift from Big fat liar.

[LAUGHING]

I was tied up the whole time. But I’ve seen you in a few other action films in the past. If you decide to make an action movie, how Gunpowder milkshake, What are you looking for?

So I haven’t done that many action films yet. I have a lot of these, but when I do them I try to pick the more unusual ones that come. I also did a movie called Shoot ‘Em Up a while back, which was similar in some ways to that movie. It was really weird and strange. So, I like something that’s a little weird than just straight ahead. And that was really strange, I thought. It has a strange sense of humor, and I like that kind of very complete, strange world that you don’t get told much about, but you can feel that it has a beginning, a middle, and an end, beyond anything is you’ve just seen what’s really cool.

The color palette is really noticeable at times.

Yes, it’s a beautiful looking movie. And it’s beautifully recorded and edited, and it’s really, really well done. Just a strange movie, too. It has a strange tone, kind of. I liked it.

Giamatti in Shoot’em Up.

New Line cinema

You mentioned Shoot ‘Em Up – that was actually the other action movie I had in mind. You happen to be a villain in this movie too. Is there anything you particularly like about playing a villain character?

I don’t really think the guy in this movie is the bad guy, in a weird way. The character of Ralph Ineson actually seems to be the villain. I mean my character is a compromised guy but he actually takes care of the girl and it seems like he actually helped her get her back together with her mom. So I don’t necessarily think he’s the bad guy, which is what I kind of liked about this guy.

But I don’t mind playing bad guys at all. And Shoot ‘Em Up — one of the things I really liked was that I would get movie villains a lot, but I was like, “Uh”. And then the bad guy in that movie was so weird and twisted that I thought, “Well, that’s a good bad guy part.”

But I don’t mind playing villains at all. I like to play them. I don’t do it that often. I feel like I play bad guys as opposed to the bad guys who mostly. I kind of play shitty, ambiguous guys, but I don’t necessarily play the bad guy.

Those “grayscale” characters.

Yes. That’s what I think this guy is. The guy in Shoot ‘Em Up was great. I mean, that was a great character. I have to break Clive Owen’s fingers and run over a baby and all. I mean, that’s a lot of fun.

This is the first time I’ve seen Karen Gillan star in a movie like this. What was it like working with her?

She was great. I mean, you know, I guess you’re right – it’s kind of her first. But it didn’t seem like the first time she’d had to take a lead. She mastered it perfectly. But she was great. It was really fun and we had a good time.

I’m impressed with these people who can do both the physical and the acting part of this kind of thing. It’s always very impressive.

Another movie that you have is Jungle cruise, this is another movie you do with The Rock. However, I don’t think you had any scenes in common San Andreas.

No we have not.

How was it this time to meet him and work with him?

He seems like one of the few people I can think of in this business who is pretty much what you think he’s going to be. And pretty much what it appears to be. He’s just a really good guy. He’s an incredibly approachable guy, and he’s just plain fun. He’s having a good time. He’s working his ass off.

I mean, he works out a good part of the day and then he comes in and does his acting. These types of athletes are just great when they act because they just want to play, they want to have a good time, they want to do the right thing, they want to do it well. It is very nice. He’s a great guy. He’s a really, really, nice guy. He is exactly what he seems to be. It really is. I really enjoyed it.

Giamatti (and Vogel) in jungle cruise.

Disney

I don’t know much about this movie, but I saw your character in the trailer and on the poster. It looks like you have a big bird on your arm.

Yes I do.

What can you tell me about this bird

Well, the bird, originally I wanted him … there really was no character. It’s actually a bit like Shoot ‘Em Up where there wasn’t really a character. They said, can you just come in and do something with it? And with it the same. They were like just want to do something with them? And I thought: okay.

And so I originally wanted a monkey to light my cigars. But it’s a Disney movie, so I couldn’t smoke cigars, and then a monkey was too difficult. Monkeys are too difficult to handle. And so they said: do you want another kind of animal? And I said what about a cockatoo or something? A really beautiful bird.

So they got me a beautiful bird. And I’ve worked with birds before and it’s really great to work with because they are really smart and can be very loving and cool, and when you are cool with them they really connect with them, you, and they are very sweet to work with. And this bird was really great. In fact, I was thinking pretty seriously about adopting this bird. But I didn’t end up doing it because there’s a lot to do, birds. But the bird was fantastic. Beautiful bird. Really cute bird.

Amazing. That sounds fun.

Yes.

Before we go, I’d like to ask a few quick questions, too potential things to come. I say potential because I saw some rumors on the internet claiming that you will repeat your repetition Amazing Spider-Man 2 Role in the coming Spider-Man: No way home Movie. Can you give us a hint, yes or no?

All I can tell you is that as far as I know I don’t. [LAUGHING]

OK. We can leave it there.

Yes.

There are also a lot of fans of your show Billions, and a new season is just around the corner. Can you give us a little hint what to expect there?

Oh … big stuff. Big stuff goes down. You’d kill me if I said something, but all I can tell you is that some big, big shit hits the fan. That’s all I can tell you.

This interview has been condensed for content and clarity.

This content is created and maintained by a third party and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may find more information on this and similar content at piano.io

source https://livehealthynews.com/paul-giamatti-on-gunpowder-milkshake-jungle-cruise-and-billons-season-6/

0 notes

swiftedbethy13 · 7 years ago

Photo

I’m now going to tell you about the most magical and amazing experience I’ve ever had and ever will have. This post is SO long so go grab some popcorn 🍿

So on October 2nd I was working a nightshift. It was little to do and just went in and checked my emails. I saw two emails from twitter saying Taylor Nation had sent me a DM!! I panicked so bad and went on my twitter to check if it was real. And on my twitter I have two DMs from Taylor fucking Nation. I stared shaking so bad and could barely breathe. The message said *CONFIDENTIAL MESSAGE* and that they have a secret, special event they would like to talk to me about, and to send my full name, phone number and best time to contact me. Have you ever tried typing in details like that while your hands are shaking so bad like you’re on drugs?! ITS HARD MAN! I obviously gave them my details (duh), and told them my lips are sealed and it sounds so exciting! Then I panicked cos I thought my reply was too late, and had to ask if I was too late, and then I apologised for sending them so many messages 😂 They said “haha you’re all good, thanks doll”. Then I was supposed to take care of newborns and their moms and stay calm at the same time. IT WAS SUCH A STRUGGLE! I had to go to the bathroom to try and breathe.

We were not supposed to tell ANYONE, but I just had to send my friend Lyndsay a message saying it’s important to check you DMs on twitter often. And she replied “I know, you too…” and I just KNEW she had gotten a message too. If she replied with something different I wouldn’t have told her anything. We started freaking out together and it was beautiful.

I didn’t know when to expect a phone call, all I knew was that I need to have my phone on sound at all times. Like you can’t miss the most important phone call of your life! I had an evening shift the next day and told work I just have to have my phone on sound cos I’m waiting for a very important phone call. Every time my phone rang I just immediately panicked 😂. I can’t remember the time but I was at work and in a patients room when my phone started ringing. I quickly said “sorry I have to take this” and ran out of the room. I look at my phone and it’s calling from New York 😱 I die and start shaking and answer. It was Ali calling from Taylor Nation!! She confirmed it was the right person she was talking too and gave me some more details. It was going to be a secret special event in London on Friday the 13th of October from 4pm-11pm. She asked if I was going to be able to make travel arrangements and I was like “duh YAS OF COURSE”. She told me I could bring a plus’s one, and since I knew that Lyndsay was already going, I gave them my friend Alex’s details. She told me again that this was confidential and I couldn’t speak about it to anyone except my parents, guardian and boss at work. I was going to get more information early the week following. I probably sounded like the most bored person cos I was IN SHOCK, like I was just “yeah” “uhu”, “yes”, and didn’t show any excitement at all 😂. She hung up and continuing work was the hardest thing EVER!

I made travel arrangements and sorted hotels with my friends. I was already going to London on the Sunday till Wednesday before the event on Friday, so I knew the week would go quick anyways. On Sunday evening I out of the blue get an email. I was at the hotel with my mom having a pamper evening, and I was SO THROWN OFF COS I THOUGHT I WOULD GET IT ON MONDAY OR TUESDAY. My mom filmed my reaction to getting this email and it shows how Taylor Swift makes me feel nearly 24/7 😂. The email again said that it was confidential and not to post anything about it or tell anyone. They gave us an address for a Holiday In hotel where we were going to meet up. They said not to bring too much personal belongings cos this was going to be taken off us as well as our phones. AT THIS POINT I STARTED TO BE MORE CERTAIN THAT I WAS GOING TO A SECRET SESSION. Hence my reaction to getting the email lol. I still tried to not get my hopes up, and tried to tell myself that maybe I’ll get to hear a new song and have a swiftie party. Good thing I was in London and could get myself an outfit. OMG IVE NEVER BEEN MORE STRESSED ABOUT FINDING AN GOOD OUTFIT EVER!! I did find it by the help of my really good friend!

THIS STORY IS GETTING SO LONG, sorry 😂 Well done for getting this far. I’m going to skip forward to Friday now (aka the best day of my life).

So, FRIDAY THE 13TH. I get up at 4am to catch my flight to London. My stomach is doing backflips trying to catch butterflies cos I was so excited and nervous and anxious at the same time. I couldn’t listen to any Taylor music cos I would just start to cry, so I ended up listening to P!nks new album (which is amazing btw). When I get to London I meet up with Lyndsay, Megan and Alex. We head to the hotel where we are going to stay and to meet up. Here we get dressed and as I was to put my makeup on I realise that I’ve forgotten all my make up and I go in a full on panic. IM SUCH AN IDIOT! Luckily Megan had makeup I could borrow. After we got ready we headed down to outside the hotel. There were loads of girls with red lipstick and dresses so we knew we were in the right place 😍. We qued up outside, they were running late, think we stood outside for 40 minuets maybe. We then got to the front of the line and inside (finally cos I was freezing my ass of). Taylor Nation was there ready to sign us in!! We signed a confidentiality contract and showed our ID and GOT OUR WRISTBAND!!! (KANDJFJRJDJ)!! It said United Kingdom on it, written in reputation font!!! SO EXCITING! We then went down the stairs to a room with lots of chairs in. There were refreshments, and hot drinks (yay for cold me!) for us while we waited for further instructions.

Then we were told to leave our stuff behind, including phone, and the first 25 people went on a bus. Me and Alex got on the second bus. Now I stared getting SO nervous, it’s ridiculous. Before we went on we where scanned by security. Then the bus took off! We drove a title while and was driving through the most posh neighbourhood EVER, like I WANNA LIVE THERE! The bus stopped and we were told to be quiet while we went off. I realised we were at a house, and you could only guess I was thinking we were at TAYLORS HOUSE!! There were lots of security while we were taken in a back entrance of the house and in through the basement. I had to knock on the door 😂 (so I could say I knocked on Taylor Swifts door, I know I’m extra 😂). We got scanned by security again before we were taken up to the kitchen. GUYS, THIS HOUSE IS AMAZING!! ITS SO HUGE. We still haven’t by this point been told where we are, but duh 🙄. I KNEW we were at Taylor’s house. Her kitchen is beautiful! She has 4 ovens!! There were lots of snack on the counters. Homemade chicken nuggets, fruit, cheese and fizzy drinks. There were also REP cookies!! And REP m&ms! SO COOL! Andrea and Scott was also in the kitchen talking to other fans. Me and Alex just hung around and talked to a few people. Then Lyndsay and Megan arrived, we hugged each other cos they also realised where we were. We then ended up talking to Scott. He has never been to Norway!! And I told him he neeeeeds to come here.

Her house smells AMAZING. I obviously had to see which candles she was burning so I could by them 😂. We were then told to get in a line as we were going to a different room. This was after everyone had arrived and had some food. Me, Alex, lyndsay and Megan were quite up front as we were taken to a living room. There were cushions on the floor and we sat down. I sat down not even thinking about where. Me and Alex chose a high cushion and shared it. A 100 people was going to fit in this room and it got really tight! When everyone had found a spot there was some whispering and the door opened a little. THEN THE QUEEN THAT IS TAYLOR SWIFT WALKS INTO THE FUCKING ROOM AND IM SCREAMING. We were so loud! I FUCKING LOVE HER SO MUCH 😭😭 Like I couldn’t believe she was like right there in the same room as me. As I was having difficulties breathing she sat down like 2 meters away from me and Alex, we had such a good view of her like OMG. Then she said we were going to hear the whole FUCKING ALBUM AND WE DIED. We now knew this was A FUCKING SECRET SESSIONS PEOPLE! SHE ALSO SAID SHE HANDPICKED EVERYONE! I FUCKING DIED! TAYLOR HAS LURKED ME FOR A YEAR WITHOUT ME KNOWING 😭😭 I’ve never had a like or a follow, and I don’t have many followers on any social media. STILL SHE FOUND ME! I’m got eye contact with her so many times during the listening 😭😭😍! SHE IS SO HAPPY TOO!! I JUST LOVE HER SO MUCH! AND IM TELLING YOU GUYS THIS ALBUM IS BLODDY AMAZING. (If you think you are stupid enough that I’m going to tell anything about the album, you are being funny, don’t bother asking 😉)

After she had pledged the album we got to look through the magazines!!! THEY ARE AMAZING AND IM SO HAPPY I WILL BE ABLE TO BUY ONE WHEN THEY COME OUT!! Then we waited to meet her JENFBDJSSHHSHDB 😭. I was getting so nervous by this point. Like I was going to meet the one person who has been there for me for so many years and I get to tell her how much I love her. We were one of the earlier ones to be sent in to meet her. Megan and Lyndsay were in front of us and a free they finished it was our turn.

I RAN OVER TO HER AND HUGGED HER AND SHE DIDNT LET GO UNTIL I DID 😭😭 I just couldn’t believe what was happening. She then hugged Alex and told me SHE FUCKING LOVE MY OUTFIT! She said “I love this whole outfit situation going on” I died. I told her that it’s not something I wear a lot and she said “you should definitely do!” IM OBVIOUSLY NEVER TAKING THIS OUTFIT OFF. Alex then said he wanted to wear the same outfit but we couldn’t match so he said I could wear it, and she laughed 😂 I love how we had a sarcastic conversation with Taylor Swift 😂 She then laughed at Alex’s apology for his bored resting face. I’m SO PROUD OF HIM SPEAKING TO TALOR, you have no idea! ❤️❤️ Then we were told to move to the side a bit cos they were going to open up the front door (so no one could see she was living there). This gave us more time with her and I’m so grateful! I then asked her about anxiety with singing and she gave me tips on singing and performing in front of people. TAYLOR FUCKING SWIFT GAVE ME ADVISE ON SINGING AND PERFORMING!! JJDNDJDJFJRJD. Alex then thanked her for giving him the best friends ever and she hugged us both again 😍 Then it was time for picture. We didn’t plan a pose, we just took one. SHE RESTED HER HEAD ON ME AND I SISNT NOTICED BEFORE I SAW THE PIC! It’s so adorable 😍 There were so much more I wanted to tell her, wish I had a few more minutes but I guess she had ALOT of other people to meet.

We then went out in the hallway and ended up talking to Andrea. She reminds me so much of my mom!! She is also a bit similar! I told her about my mom and that she was worried I was sleeping in the airport by my self the following night. We then talked about how happy Taylor is and she was tearing up 😭 It was so beautiful to see how happy her parents were for her 😍😍 We gave her a biiiiig hug and then walked down to the basement again. There we stood trying to comprehend what just happened. I still don’t believe it, don’t know if I ever will? We then got merch!!! We got a REP tote bag, pop socket, t-shirt, a sticker, a cap and the best thing ever, a exclusive keychain that only us on the secret sessions London got. IT WAS SO NICE OF THEM! We were then sent on the bus back to the hotel. There we spoke to Ali about confidentially again and what we could talk about and not. She is so sweet!! Megan and Lyndsay old us TAYLOR KNEW WE WERE IN NASHVILLE TOGETHER 😭😭 OMG!!

When we came back to the hotel I called my mom and SOBBED. I couldn’t even talk to her cos I was crying too much. Then I posted online on my social media about what happened and my phone wouldn’t stop buzzing.

I AM SO GRATEFUL FOR TALOR SWIFT. THANK YOU SO SO SO MUCH FOR THIS!! And thank you to Taylor Nation for giving us this opportunity, it means so much to us ❤️ The picture ended up perfect and I’m going to hang it on my wall so I can stare at it everyday 😍 I’ve been crying since Sunday cos this has been so so emotional to me. I can’t even tell people what happened without crying.

@isturkeyanickname

I’m sorry this story is a mile long 😂

Thank you so much @taylorswift and @taylornation

#taylor swift #taylornation #reputationsecretsessions #london #my story

321 notes · View notes

limejuicer1862 · 5 years ago

Text

Wombwell Rainbow Interviews

I am honoured and privileged that the following writers local, national and international have agreed to be interviewed by me. I gave the writers three options: an emailed list of questions or a more fluid interview via messenger or an interview on their most recent book, or a combination of these.

The usual ground is covered about motivation, daily routines and work ethic, but some surprises too. Some of these poets you may know, others may be new to you. I hope you enjoy the experience as much as I do.

Stephen Claughton

grew up in Manchester, read English at Oxford and worked for many years as a civil servant in London. His poems have appeared widely in magazines, both in print and online, and he has recently published two pamphlets: The War with Hannibal (Poetry Salzburg, 2019) and The 3-D Clock (Dempsey and Windle, 2020). He reviews regularly for London Grip and blogs occasionally at www.stephenclaughton.com, where links to his reviews, poems and pamphlets can also be found.

The Interview

1. What inspired you to write poetry?

I can’t remember what originally inspired me. I began writing poems in my early teens, but didn’t really get going until I retired from the Civil Service ten years ago. I like to think that I was held back by lack of time, but really it was a lack of confidence. Poetry was too important to me to risk failing. Then, once I’d reached a certain age, I realised I’d got nothing left to lose. You can’t write without taking risks; you have to accept every time the possibility of failure.

2. Who introduced you to poetry?

As an English teacher, my mother was very keen that I should like literature. I remember one wet holiday, when she insisted on reciting part of The Song of Hiawatha to me, but I wasn’t a bookish child and — much to her dismay — resisted her attempt to interest me in it. The 3-D Clock, my pamphlet about her dementia, reflects what always remained a difficult relationship. Poetry — and literature more generally — was something I had to discover for myself, encouraged by some excellent teachers at my school. It was, of course, a great help then to have books in the house. (I read Hiawatha again recently and for the most part I concur with my youthful judgement.)

3. How aware were you of the dominating presence of older poets?

English was my main interest at school and the subject I went on to study at university, so I was aware of the poetic tradition. But it was 20th century poets who first sparked my interest — Eliot, Auden and Dylan Thomas from school anthologies — and then the usual influences on my generation — poets such as Ted Hughes, Thom Gunn, R S Thomas, Philip Larkin, Seamus Heaney and Robert Lowell (all but one of them Faber poets). Robert Graves was also an influence, although I think The White Goddess made more of an impression at that time than the poems themselves.

4. What is your daily writing routine?

I’m ashamed to say that I don’t really have one. In the past, I tended to write when I felt like it, provided nothing more pressing needed doing. It probably explains why I got so little done! These days, although I’m retired, I have a number of other calls on my time — as a town and borough councillor and (before the pandemic lockdown) helping to look after our young grandson. It’s meant that in order to remain seriously committed to writing, I have to be more careful about managing my time. I’ve been surprised by how productive it can be just to sit down and apply yourself, although it can also be very frustrating. I work best in the late morning, late afternoon, or early evening.

5. What motivates you to write?

I can’t really explain the need to write poetry, other than that it’s been a compulsion I’ve had for most of my life. Even when I wasn’t publishing any poems, I was still planning them in my head and producing various, unsatisfactory drafts. There has to be something that sparks a poem off — an idea, a line, an image; I couldn’t write one to order. I’ve recently started reviewing, which is something I do for enjoyment. It helps that I have some say in the books I review and don’t have to work to deadlines. I like to take my time, so that I’m not influenced by any particular mood I’m in — I worry about being fair. Fortunately, I haven’t had to write any unfavourable reviews so far, although I do say what I think works and doesn’t work.

6. What is your work ethic?

Professionally, I used to have a strong work ethic, but when you retire people don’t expect it of you and you don’t expect it of yourself. (Thom Gunn stopped writing poetry after he gave up his academic job — he no longer had the motivation.) I get twitchy, if I haven’t been working on a poem for a bit. I wouldn’t want to write out of a sense of duty, but having started late, there’s always the sense of having to make up for lost time.

7. How do the writers you read when you were young influence you today?

I think it’s more in terms of subject matter than style. The War with Hannibal has two poems about Larkin, one occasioned by The Guardian reprinting an old article, “Poet on the 8.15”, and another about Larkin’s famous last words (‘I am going to the inevitable’), which I’d hoped to write as a cento, consisting entirely of lines by Larkin. That didn’t work out, but the poem includes references to several of his poems. Some of my early influences were unhelpful — Eliot in particular. I read him when I was too young to understand what he was doing and just thought that good poetry had to be obscure. It took me a long time to find my way out of that blind alley. I wrote one poem, when I was fourteen, that seemed to come out of nowhere and was highly praised, but after that my teenage career went rapidly downhill. I recently came across one of the poems I was trying to write then, still in the plastic writing case I used to use. It was so awful that I binned the lot without a second thought. ‘Inspissated’ is the only word to describe my style then.

8. Who of today’s writers do you admire the most and why?

There’s a long list of poets I admire and I’m always finding people I should have read years ago. Ciaran Carson, who died last year, is an example. Perhaps because of my early tangle with Eliot, I’m most attracted to poets who write accessible poems in a conversational style (though Eliot himself could, of course, adopt a conversational mode). Hugo Williams, in particular, helped me get back on track. Reading about the way he rewrote poems as a whole rather than line by line was an eye-opener. Before that, I’d put poems together in the painstaking, bit-by-bit way of the fictional poets, Gordon Comstock (in Orwell’s Keep the Aspidistra Flying) and Anthony Burgess’s Enderby. Some of my more recent poems have come easily, but a lot have been through multiple drafts — usually to try and make them sound more spontaneous! There’s something of the obsessive-compulsive about me.

Another, less well-known, poet who inspired me was Gareth Reeves. I particularly liked the moving series of poems about his father, the poet and critic James Reeves, gradually losing his sight. It intrigued me that you could convey so much in such a simple-seeming way. Of course, it’s only when you try to do it yourself that you realise how difficult it is. I also like the poems of Reeves’ Oxford contemporary, Grevel Lindop. Both are or were academics and Lindop has written biographies of De Quincey and Charles Williams, as well as producing an edition of The White Goddess.

9. Why do you write, as opposed to doing anything else?

I can’t really explain why I’m compelled to write poetry, except to say that my life would be very empty without it. Poetry is a way of capturing something alive. What you do with it when you’ve caught it is another matter and one that’s always open for debate. For me, it’s principally a way of finding meaning and structure in an increasingly crazy world. Also, I like the concentration that’s required by any kind of writing. The same is true of reading, of course, but writing gives you the prospect of having produced something at the end of it. It’s mostly an unconscious process. The only real control I have is when I’m acting as my own editor. Writing and reviewing have given me a sense, for the first time, of doing something that feels ‘right’.

10. What would you say to someone who asked you “How do you become a writer?”

I’d say the usual things — practise your craft and read as widely as possible. Like most things, the more you do the better you become at it. As for reading, I’m lucky to be within striking distance of the National Poetry Library, which is an excellent resource, but other libraries are available. Most of all, don’t be afraid of failure. You can’t get anywhere without being prepared to take risks. And lastly, don’t give up: as long as the impulse is there, keep on writing.

11. Tell me about the writing projects you have on at the moment.

There are a few poems I’ve been working on about my mother’s dementia that didn’t make it in time for The 3-D Clock, although I hope that, when they’re finished, that will be it: I don’t want to keep writing about the same subject. I’m interested in ekphrastic poems. The War with Hannibal has two: one about a watercolour sketch by van Dyck and another about Munch’s “The Night Wanderer”. I’ve written others since and perhaps I’ll have enough for a small collection one day. I’m also toying with the idea of doing a ‘version’ of some incidents from The Aeneid, which I studied at school. And it’s hard these days not to write about the current pandemic, although it may not produce anything useable in my case. I don’t know if anything will come of any of these projects. I depend on poems approaching me rather than me them.

Wombwell Rainbow Interviews: Stephen Claughton Wombwell Rainbow Interviews I am honoured and privileged that the following writers local, national and international have agreed to be interviewed by me.

0 notes

davewakeman · 5 years ago

Text

Talking Tickets: 21 February 2020--MLB! NBA! NHL! And More!

Hey everybody!

How’s your week? Let me know!

If you haven’t had a chance to fill out my short survey yet, I’d appreciate it if you’d take 3-4 minutes to share your thoughts and ideas so that I can make sure this newsletter and the podcast continue to deliver value to y’all.

Anytime you want to say hello or share something with me, you can always reply to this email…you definitely will get a response from a live human.

To the tickets!

————————————————————————————————————

1. MLB continues to struggle to put the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal in the rearview mirror:

My frustration with baseball is that they just are always on the back foot to use a soccer term.

This week really highlighted the challenge that is going to have for the game to ever right its ship.

I know they report that they are making more money than ever, but from an attendance standpoint, reporting tickets distributed while Twitter is showing you stadiums sitting there with 3,000-5,000 fans a lot of nights isn’t a great look.

Compare MLB’s reaction to the Astros scandal with the way that Man City’sbreach of Financial Fair Play in Europe is being handled and you see a leadership gap, which hasn’t been helped by the Rob Manfred trying to throw the blame everywhere but his office.

From a marketing standpoint, a tough situation, selling baseball in a crowded market, has gotten more difficult.

I’ll type up some more thoughts about this on my blog, but here are a few actionable things:

1. Stop digging. Rob Manfred’s PR team shouldn’t keep running him out there if he is just saying the same things. If you find yourself in a PR crisis, please don’t just start saying crazy things.

2. Step back and focus on how you are going to move forward. Just speaking about the scandal in the past tense isn’t very effective. You have to have a clear plan for moving forward.

In any organization, change begins by sharing a compelling vision for the future. This is obviously a challenge for MLB and all the teams, not just the ones directly implicated in the scandal. The teams need some leadership and a vision for how this ends and how the game gets back on the front foot, their partners and sponsors need this, and their fans and customers deserve it.

3. I’ve worked with teams that have won the World Series and one of the coolest things from my teenage years was making friends with a member of the World Series winning Big Red Machine teams and going over to my friend’s house to see his replica trophies.

Don’t slag on your trophies, ever. Those trophies represent much of the power and emotional connection your fans have to your sport and if you are crapping on that, why are people supposed to even care?

2. The NBA is seeing some financial challenges from their dust-up with China:

I’ve had the flu this week and I haven’t had the voice to record the intro to a new, updated episode with Greg Turner about doing business in China, but if you can make out anything from the first episode, it would be how this was to be expected. (Technical difficulties due to the firewall in China’s internets caused the first episode to be a big disjointed.)

It seems like the NBA is reporting taking about a 4% hit on revenue this year due to standing up for their beliefs in dealing with China.

In a world where brands are all shouting about how “cause marketing” is so important, real cause marketing means you put your bottom line on the line. The NBA did that, on purpose or not.

To me, the more problematic situation that the NBA is facing right now is a ratings slump at the local level with the Warriors falling 66% and the average team down 13%. Which mirror a slump in the NBA’s ratings this year despite a jump in viewership for this year’s All-Star Game.

Right now, we see the NFL rushing to finish up a new labor deal so that they can negotiate their next round of TV deals while extreme premiums are still likely to be had.

My concern is that losing ratings for a season isn’t going to harm the NBA too much, but if the trend of NBA viewing continues to lag, the issues in China become a multi-year challenge, and maybe you have some more injuries, retirements, or other on-court issues…the revenue becomes challenged. And, that trickles down to raising ticket prices, concessions, and merchandise to levels that to higher levels than they are now.

I mean, you’re already seeing in New Orleans with Zion.

As we’ve seen since the online shopping has become so prominent, we have trained consumers to wait and shop for deals. We’ve also seen an entire generation of marketers and business folks that have become almost blindly committed to managing by spreadsheet while consumer spending on experiences has increased dramatically.

TV viewership is a fickle beast. Live by the sword, die by the sword…I guess.

The real focus here has to be on creating communities of fans around teams, communities, stories, and experiences. These can absolutely happen online and offline.

P.S. The NHL is having hiccups as well. This can be even more problematic because the NHL probably would benefit from more television exposure.

3. Rage Against The Machine is raising money for charity and taking on the secondary market:

I’m going to guess that the Rage Against The Machine tour is going to be interesting. It is their first tour in a decade. It is an election year. It seems like a perfect storm for them, yeah?

This idea that Rage is going to thwart the secondary market would seem consistent with their ethos. Raising money for charities also seems on brand.

Where the big challenge comes in, is whether or not the charity pricing aspect was explained clearly at the start.

Pearl Jam does a similar thing with their charity tickets that support their Vitalogy Foundation. They handle it slightly differently, which I think helps with the messaging and the fan blowback.

To me, this is just a situation where if you have a fan base and you can sell the tickets directly with no issues at all, sell. But today’s consumer also has a higher expectation of transparency…so that if you are going to institute a charity program like Rage to fight the secondary market, just share that at the start.

BTW, where did Tom Morello get his “85% of the secondary market” comment anyway?

And, Don Vaccaro and TicketNetwork have committed to donating all their service fees from the first 3 shows in March to National Action Network, the civil-rights organization founded by the Reverend Al Sharpton.

4. Congress is going to continue to investigate the world of tickets:

Just as I trying to close out this week’s newsletter, this news came down the pipe. So, on February 26th, 2020, Congress is going to hold a hearing on tickets.

This comes on the heels of a letter being released that Pearl Jam sent to Representative Frank Pallone Jr on Wednesday saying that the BOSS act will hurt consumers and pointing to transferability and transparency of the number of tickets being on sale would be bad for consumers.

After the release of Pearl Jam’s letter, Bill Pascrell sent out a release of his own rejecting Pearl Jam’s feedback on the BOSS act.

This continued investigation of the ticket business is a global trend. Last week, I talked about the CMA in the UK halting the Viagogo & StubHub merger due to their concerns, even as the US government approved the deal despite these objections.

And, this week, news out of Australia shows that people are rallying around an Information Standard in regards to the secondary market.

Along with the UK government stating they will investigate the illegal resale of football tickets in the UK after a report in the Guardian uncovered the ins and outs of massive football ticket resale.

As for how do you approach this story:

* Pay attention to what comes out of next week’s hearing. I stated at the time of the workshop in June of 2019 that I felt like this would be an issue that would hang over the industry through the election because it is easy for both sides to beat down on ticket sellers, technology companies, resellers, and everyone involved in the industry directly or indirectly. Fun for the whole family.

* I’d also pay attention to what gets defined as “consumer” friendly. I’m on the side of giving Pearl Jam the benefit of the doubt. They’ve worked pretty hard and taken steps that definitely haven’t been in their own best interests to do what was right for their fans, but I’m also conscious of unintended consequences.

5. Red Bull shows how to grow a team from the ground up:

RB Leipzig beat Spurs 1-0 on Wednesday! (Just adding to the suffering of having the flu. You think Dele was mad…try watching a poor showing while barely keeping your eyes open and feeling like reheated death!)

But this story is really great in the context of the continuing story of the Astros scandal in the States, Man City in Europe, and Thursday’s news of the arrest of PSG’s president for bribery.

Closer to home for me, it highlights what is possible with vision as the Mets are for sale and the sale has started to have its own amount of drama…and, as the Knicks continue to struggle at MSG.

3 things here:

1. Vision is so important. Melbourne FC just released a plan this week for their fans. It was called out on Australian radio, but without a plan and a vision…you don’t ever reach your potential.

2. Winning matters, but community is powerful. I’ve given this speech on 3 continents now…but you can’t just sell winning, you need to build a community. Leipzig is showing that now and we can see in a lot of places that there is a thing like winning fatigue. Or, in the case of the Warriors, a new arena and a lot of winning aren’t going to fix a bad season in every case.

3. Marketing matters: Red Bull’s involvement in sports and the way they have managed their teams shows that they understand the value of marketing and they understand that great brands, teams, and organizations aren’t built in a day.

While their teams haven’t been successful 100% of the time, they have been consistent and have continued to focus on their vision, their values, and their message over and over. That’s something we can all learn from. —————————————————————————————————————-

What am I up to this week?

I’ve got a couple of webinars coming up this week starting with Wednesday’s visit of my ebook created in partnership with Booking Protect: What Matters In Ticketing Now. Sign up for the webinar and learn ideas, trends, and actions that you can take to put these insights to work for your business.

On Thursday, I’m turning my eye to sales by putting together: The Language of the Sale–10 Ways To Use Language More Effectively In Your Sales Process. This is built on the last 6-9 months of sales training I’ve done with teams around the world and this one will be fast and actionable for your team as soon as you get through with the webinar.

Check out the podcast archives: new episodes coming this week now that my voice is coming back. If you have suggestions for guests and the podcast, fill out the survey at the top of the page.

Please follow and like us:

Talking Tickets: 21 February 2020–MLB! NBA! NHL! And More! was originally published on Wakeman Consulting Group

#marketing #sports business #tickets

0 notes

fyrapartnersearch · 7 years ago

Text

The captain has turned off the fasten seatbelt sign

Hello, this is your captain speaking. We’re currently flying at the altitude where passenger planes can be spotted! One of my co-pilots is starting to disembark before landing, so I am currently searching for a craft that will carry a story on new wings!

About your aviator: My name’s Jaimie. Hi!

I’ve been flying for many years (15+) but more recently have been stationed abroad (Therefore I’m not going to dole out timezones- it scares away the passengers) all you really need to know is that outside of my flight pattern (my hobby) I have a really time consuming job (40+ hours) but fear not! Rain or shine, this plane always makes the trip! My trips are normally good for one ride a day, however, sometimes I’m willing to take a layover if the going’s good.

Age wise, I’m 27. Welp.

You’ll notice (or not) in the tags, I clicked fandoms. Despite the fandom ‘click’ I will only use original characters (OCs ONLY).

Let’s go over some air safety rules!

- Noted above, I only write OCs. Please don’t email me about [Spiderman x Deadpool] or whatever the kids are writing now. NO. I don’t want to role-play your fandom! Hope that clears that up.

- I only write as men. I am looking for a MxM role-play. I double often with a vast range of characters (I repeat, I this aircraft serves all kinds!). I respect your want to play any other story, do not email me saying, “I read your post, but I really like writing a female…lol is that okay?” I will politely turn you down and privately share your faux-pas with my colleagues about you not being able to read. So…hope that clears that up…

- Please be legal age if you want to write NSFW stories. You must be 18 or older to fly unaccompanied by a legal guardian. I am an adult, I would prefer adult themes but I am not above writing SFW stories either. Let me know what you’re interested in…and your age. We can discuss limits should it be needed.

- I like to think I’m pretty friendly, I would love to talk to you! If you want to chat or be buddy buddy, cool beans friend! I’m all for those kinds of words.

- This has been peeving me for some time. Everyone always says, “I usually get dropped because x doesn’t respond/ the story dips off and I don’t know what to write/ I have no time/ I need time to think of a reply/ etc.”

I will absolutely tell you if the story is going nowhere/ let you know if I want to stop/ Can’t write anymore. Please do the same. I will not be upset and respect you more for it. I might even hit you up if you feel like the time might be right at another date. To those who have previously messaged me, please don’t re-message. It didn’t work for some reason, I see you floating around here too. To you, I say good day sir-madams!

- Lastly, I will provide story prompts and name my character I intend on using. The plotting point of the role-play (not even the writing) is usually where I lose people…I also get the line, “What are you into…I’ll write whatever…You choose…” Well damn. I will choose. Call it, fatigue from the lack of will to be frank about what one truly wants.

* (Character bio’s in depth will be provided to those interested in the story/character combo.)

The Flight plan (plots)

1. (Fantasy/Sci-fi/Modern) Startop or affectionately dubbed 'ST’ by his small group of companions is a botanist and lover of any kind of plant life. Working in a world filled with something akin to 'scientific magic’ people not only live along side the growing technological industry but also have discovered alchemic answers to the 'magic tricks’ in the world. As a result animal-like monstrosities have been released in this land along with anomalies in the plant life. A glorious haven for ST, he works in an old castle like building, toiling behind 'chemicals’ to enhance plants to better serve humanity. There is a 'slip up’ here and there, but nothing that can’t be swept under the proverbial rug…or burned. The quirky semi-scientist who slums it in a laboratory has never lived a life of adventure in the fantastic world around him. They say he can work magic on foliage but perhaps someone in his genus could strike up some chemistry instead.

2. (FANDOM- Love Pistols Manga) (Notice: if you have no idea what this is, please either google it or over look this prompt). After losing his best friend to another man in South Korea, Leroy is devastated. At the losing end of a love triangle, the heavyweight faces his future back in New York with disdain. The god-father to his secret love’s son and rival of his current lover. Leroy finds little joy in the time spent back home. Everyone is moving on without him and being the heir to his father’s banking company, Leroy will either face an arranged marriage in order to keep the family wheel turning or find someone to replace his previous 'Prince’. It’s tough being an Alligator in such a cold city, but maybe someone can help this reptile warm up.

3. (Fantasy) Serbian is foremost a sorcerer but a small fact remains that he is also a demon. Demons fall in many categories in this world, some being benign, others being a threat. In this world there are humans and those who are not. Serbian falls into the aforementioned slot, which he is all too painfully aware of. Spending his time with a page held against her will, and a two tailed beast, the demon often finds himself peddling his wares to fellow demons and humans alike, forever on the move, a nomad in a mysterious continent. Yet, the humans strive to rid the world of demon-kind engineering 'aeygles’ a hybrid of human and demon kind to ward of the surmounting threat to humanity. Stifled with a secret hidden within himself, Serbian struggles to live in a chaotic world wrought with danger, aeygles, daemons, mystery, and magic. Will he succumb to the rise of humanity, or help snuff it out before the Aeygles prove to be more dangerous to both demons and humans alike?

4. (Fantasy/Slice of Life/Modern) Thad is a damn good chef. He has hit a low point however and now works in a sleazy part of town, in a run down restaurant, smack between a strip joint and a dollar theatre. This doesn’t get him down however, being a slacker is kind of his thing. When he’s not working, he spends his time in bars, drinking, or playing the bass in a punk band for kicks. The point remains however, Thad is a damn good chef. He has been for over 500 years. Though that’s pretty young in the lifetime of an imp. The world has always had a side not so often seen, and his world is nearly invisible, thanks to the OG monsters who kept things in the shadows. Life for monsters has been changing however, vampires being more lax, werewolves running amok from time to time. Still, despite this low point, it’s but a small bump in the trajectory of his so-called life. He’ll either continue on as he has been for 500 years or be thrown for a loop by whatever comes his way. But that’s the beauty of life. You never know who or what might be coming down the road.

5. (Fantasy/Sci-fi) On the alien planet of Avis, in the Sol System- a neighbor to old Earth’s Solar System there live a species undisturbed for eons. Despite the lack of communication between others, the Harpee have thrived with their minimalist technologies, living on their harsh, jungle infested planet. Muteo, a young Harpee prince is leery of taking on his mother’s position as ruler of his people. However, with four waring factions between the Harpee, there is a little competition. With the threat of contact from other worlds looming and the choice to follow in his mother’s footsteps- what is the prince to do? Will he choose to explore these 'settlers’ from another world, or to unify his people and fight them.

There you have it folks! Grab your ticket and fall in line, we’ll be boarding soon!

I only role-play through email: [email protected] (there it is!)

Please don’t email me with no idea what you’re interested in. If you want something a little different or want to modify the stories in any way, please let me know! I’m all for the change! I am also willing to collaborate on a plot/character IF a decent story has been developed and the need arises to make another character.

#oc rp #long term #email #submission

1 note · View note

davidarc · 5 years ago

Text

An Alternative Author Interview:

TCL’s Countdown Questions.

This week I’m featuring author, editor, speaker, writing coach, ghost-writer, (and my friend) Roz Morris.

I came to know Roz Morris when she contacted me with a request to read and review one of her books. Now, normally, when someone pitches me a novel in a genre I don’t usually read, I back off immediately. But there was something about that email that caught my attention, so I agreed, albeit reluctantly. Then, by chance (maybe because she recognized my reluctance), she told me she was also coming out with a memoir/travel book, Not Quite Lost. Well, that was it! I quickly begged off the novel and with my usual chutzpah, asked for the non-fiction book instead. And what a pleasure it was! (It even prompted me to ask her to do a guest post for me, and the book got an honorable mention as my favorite non-fiction book of that year.) Since then, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting up with her twice on our (frequent) visits to London. That’s why I had to ask her to answer my questions, and she lovingly replied…

If you could visit five (5) places you’ve never been, where would you go and why?

This is prose, not reality, so I’ll make full use of my poetic licence.

My first choice is the underwater ballroom in my novel Lifeform Three. Years ago, I read about a ballroom on the bed of a lake, the last remaining piece of a stately home in Surrey, UK. I have an over-romantic mind and have always loved stately homes, especially ones that have been demolished (this one burned down). I imagine the air retains their shape, a morphic resonance of attics, passageways and the dramas that were played there. But I digress. This underwater room is still in existence. It’s made of glass, grimed by algae and reached by a tunnel. Isn’t that amazing? It isn’t open to the public, though if you look on line you’ll find pictures from urban explorers.

My two next choices are also hidden.

Number two is the cubby hole where the transatlantic internet cables enter the UK. The pixels you’re seeing right now are probably streaming through there. I want to stand in that room and know I’m next to the aorta of our modern lives.

Choice three is the disused Tube Station at Down Street, London, between Green Park and Hyde Park on the Piccadilly Line. Or any disused Tube station. You can sometimes see them from the trains, though not much is visible. But as you stare into the darkness you can imagine old tiling, torn posters tattering in the wind. They are time capsules of the day they were closed. Get me there.

By Mike Quinn, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22849243

Choice four is outer space. This is not hidden, unlike my other choices, but I’d probably need special magic to visit it as I’m short sighted, and poor astronaut material.

For my fifth choice, may I have time travel? (TCL: of course!) Take me to 1909. That’s the year my childhood home was built. A couple of years ago I discovered it was knocked down, so I wrote an obituary for it in my travel memoir Not Quite Lost. If time travel is possible, I’d like to see it in its original Arts & Crafts glory, with its stained glass, leaded light windows overlooking the rolling lawns, carriages in the coach house and horses in the stables. (Roz took most of these pictures, which also appear on an article she did at this website.)

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Name four (4) foods or dishes that you enjoy so much that they’ve practically become part of your personality.

I like a lot of food so this is a difficult answer.

My first choice is taramasalata. I first encountered it when I moved to London to start college. In Cheshire where I grew up, it was regarded as improper and uncivilised – if you even saw it at all. I’d never even heard of dips and suddenly, in London, here was this Greek stuff, invitingly gloopy, intriguingly savoury. And pink. It marked the start of an exciting, exotic, cosmopolitan kind of life. It’s still my go-to comfort food, or one of them.

My second choice is millionaire’s shortbread. Shortbread, caramel and chocolate. Essentially, it’s a posh version of Twix, which I like well enough anyway, but I’m on a mission to find the ultimate millionaire’s shortbread.

My third choice needs a preamble. I love adventurous ingredients and I have an enormous collection of recipe books. When people come to dinner, I ask ‘is there anything you hate to eat or will kill you? Tell me everything, even if you think it’s unlikely I’ll cook it’. Here’s a dish to represent this – belly pork braised in coffee, star anise, liquorice, quince and mushrooms, from Peter Gordon’s Fusion. You have been warned.

My fourth choice is aged steak, cooked rare. Sometimes a slab of bloody meat exactly hits the spot.

There is the past, the present, and the future – if you could choose, which of these three (3) would you prefer to live in, and why?

The present. The older I get, the more comfortable I am in my skin, and the more I cherish the people, creatures and places that are dear to me. I wouldn’t want to be without them or the history that has made me appreciate them. I hope I will always want to live in the present (but I wouldn’t mind a spot of time travel as mentioned above).

Best and worst – you choose which – name two (2) of either your best moments of your life, worst moments of your life, or one of each.

Worst – having to ask the vet to put my horse down. He was very old and arthritic, and I didn’t doubt it was the right decision. But I thought when the time came that the vet would say, as with any other treatment: ‘I think we should do this’ and I could say ‘I agree’. But it seemed she couldn’t make this a ‘yes or no’ question. I had to formulate a sentence to make the request. I felt bad about it in a complex way. I knew it was right, yet I was asking her to do something terrible. But you cannot kill a horse yourself. I then had to ask for the assistance of the stable yard who’d helped me look after him, and thus there were several people I involved in this terrible thing.

The best? When Dave asked me to marry him (and I realised I should take him seriously). I told you I’m a romantic. More than 26 years on we’re still very amused by each other.

Name one (1) book you’ve read in the past year (or so) that you wish you had written, and why.

Only one! Such cruelty. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett. A group of people held hostage in an embassy in an unnamed country gradually form a kind of uneasy Eden with their captors, triggered by their reactions to the singing of a world-class soprano. It’s haunting and human, beautifully written. The pace may look slow but something is unfolding all the time. I first read it years ago, but reread it recently so I think it fits your criterion. (TCL: “or so” can be interpreted in any way you wish!)

Thanks Roz! I hope we can meet up again next time we’re in London. It is always fun! By the way, my husband read Bel Canto, but I haven’t gotten around to reading it yet. Perhaps I should!

Roz Morris is an award-nominated novelist (“My Memories of a Future Life” and “Lifeform Three”), and has branched into travel memoir with “Not Quite Lost – Travels Without A Sense of Direction”. She is also a professional book doctor to award-winning writers (Roald Dahl Funny Prize 2012), teaches writing masterclasses for The Guardian and has sold 4 million books as a ghost-writer. Find her at her website and on her blog, contact her on Facebook , find her newsletter and tweet her as @Roz_Morris.

Links: My Memories of a Future Life Lifeform Three Not Quite Lost

TCL's Countdown Questions #15: Author Roz Morris. Find out how the most famous, best-selling, ghostwriter you've never heard of, who graciously answered my five, fast and fun questions. Thank you @Roz_Morris for participating in this. An Alternative Author Interview: TCL's Countdown Questions. This week I’m featuring author, editor, speaker, writing coach, ghost-writer, (and my friend)

#author #authors #Commentary #Countdown Questions #Guest Author Post #interview #Memes

0 notes

glassconway6-blog · 6 years ago

Text

Advantages And Disadvantages Of Online Shopping

0 of 8192 characters usedPost CommentNo HTML is allowed in comments, but URLs will be hyperlinked. Comments are not for promoting your articles or other sites. More and more this seems to be the choice of people. I find it very convenient as well when the local choices are not very good. I am agree with the text in some points becouse the online shopping is a topic very important for many people . I am agree with the text in some points becouse the online shopping is a topic very important for many people . In fact, an advantage is that It makes products easy to find for example when you need to buy anything you dont have to visit the store becouse if you are working all day you can find anything in minutes.

Nevertheless some people prefer to visit the store for know how is the product and see detail the characteristic. In the modern world the people have limited time and the ways for the purchase have changed, as a result, the e comerce have been an important tool for people that not have time for going to a establishment. For me the biggest advantage is when you shopping online there are not long lines you have to put up. For me the biggest advantage is when you shopping online there aren’t long lines you have to put up. In fact It´s very easy to pay! 2 to 5 days until your product arrive to house.

Im very agrre with the text but soms times pages where people say to sale products are very wrongs because they stole the money or your bank acount. It is very useful. I love this site, for now on i will always search on this site because there are lots of information's and this also helped me with my work. I wouldn't say online shopping makes you "lazy," just smart. Loved it loved it loved it it's so much intereting today i have an english test and this helped me so much thank you and wish me good luck ! It will be much safer to use Paypal or other online credit card payment gateway to make payment as we can open a dispute issue if our order items did not sent out by any online merchant.

Arrow is a brand from the house of Cluett Peabody & Company, Inc., which is again a subsidiary of the popular PVH Corp. Arrow has been bringing out classy shirts for American men since its establishment in the year 1885. The brand has always commanded a lot of respect in terms of American men’s shirt business because of their inimitable and functional style. Now you can buy Arrow shirts online and stay trendy and chic in any season. The origin of the company can be traced back to the innovation of unique, detachable collar shirts. The brand has incessantly reformed itself to the ever-changing trends in the world of fashion.

It has been restyling its products with the changing times. Arrow has become a globally commended shirt brand because of its thoughtful brand vision of catering to the constantly varying consumer needs, while also offering authentic American way of style to the way a man dresses himself in. Arrow Shirts bring the American spirit and masculinity while remaining true to the idea of picking value without having to give up on the style quotient. Arrow has been manufacturing formal and casual shirts in different sub-brands such as Arrow, Arrow Sport, Arrow Sports and Arrow New York. There are solid, striped and checkered shirts that will add more class to your masculine look.

Choose wisely from the massive range of exquisitely designed shirts from the brand that knows what and whom it is producing clothes for. Leave your friends and colleagues wondering how easily you carry yourself with confidence and style - an alluring blend. Try different sleeve lengths to suit your mood and the bottoms you wear. 3/4th, half and full sleeves can suit your changing requirements. Arrow shirts can make you look your best for a much-awaited date, a late night party, or an outing with friends. If you are on the heavier side and of medium height, you can try vertical stripes which make you look taller.

Strut across your favourite streets and break a few hearts wearing the neutral colours or make bold fashion statement with vibrant-coloured Arrow shirts. Arrow shirts are available for purchase on different online stores. Buy the best shirts available in the best price range and own all your favourite shirts. Fill your closet with Arrow shirts that go well with your ensemble for any occasion. Check out the premier online shopping destinations of India and be spoiled for choice with a large collection of Arrow shirts waiting to impress you with their quality and style. Enjoy the matchless convenience of shopping online. Spend your precious evenings at home, without having to get stuck in traffic and going from one shop to another in search of different shirts. Relax on your couch with your laptop. Browse through different online websites and add all those shirts you want to your cart. Make safe and secure online payment and wait for your favourite shirts to be speed delivered to you.

Online shopping was invented and pioneered by Michael Aldrich in the UK. In 1979 he connected a modified domestic television via a telephone line to a real- time multi-user transaction processing computer. He marketed the system from 1980 onwards and sold mainly Business-to-Business systems. The systems were installed in the UK, Ireland and Spain. There were a number of significant world firsts with new applications in holiday travel, vehicle and spares sales, loan finance, and credit ratings. There were only two Business-to-Consumer projects in the 1980s, both using the Aldrich system, Gateshead SIS with Tesco and, shortly afterwards, Bradford Centrepoint with Wm. Morrison. Both projects used supermarkets rather than warehouses for order fulfilment. Both projects were social service experiments but they proved the concept of online grocery sales and home delivery. Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web server and browser in 1990. In 1992 Charles Stack opened the world’s first online bookstore and in 1994 Jeff Bezos started Amazon. In the same year NETSCAPE introduced SSL encryption which made online data transfer secure. Online banking also began in 1994 and Pizza Hut opened an online pizza shop. In 1996, eBay opened and Tesco started a full online shopping service.

Buying flowers online has always been a huge hassle that yields sub-par results, but not anymore. Unlock More FREE Analytics. We’ll give you a glimpse of more of our powerful real-time ad analytics. Sorry, we only accept work mail accounts. Please check your email and click on the verify link - it will return you right back to this page with the data unlocked. Sorry, we do not accept free email accounts. Please check your email and click on the verify link - it will return you right back to this page with the data unlocked. Ready for the big time?

Request a trial of the iSpot TV Ad Analytics platform. Ready for the big time? You've hit your data view limit. Time to upgrade to the full iSpot TV Ad Analytics platform. Add an Actor/Actress to this spot! Submissions should come only from the actors themselves, their parent/legal guardian or casting agency. Please include at least one social/website link containing a recent photo of the actor. Submissions without photos may not be accepted. Voice over actors: provide a link to your professional website containing your reel. Submit ONCE per commercial, and allow 48 to 72 hours for your request to be processed.

MUMBAI:For 32-year-old Anirudh Sehgal (name changed), an executive with a multinational corporation, online shopping brought distraction to his work and distress to his personal finances. Sehgal would always have multiple shopping apps open on his mobile phone and shop secretly for thrill, spending a bulk of his salary buying unnecessary stuff. An online shopping de-addiction programme conducted by his employer last quarter came as a life saver. Optum International, the organisation that conducted the de-addiction programme, has since also connected him with a counsellor. Amber Alam, head of business (India), Optum International (formerly PPC Worldwide), a provider of employee counselling.

It has so far conducted online shopping de-addiction programmes for about 500 executives. The tribe of such compulsive online prodigals is slowly growing, say counsellors and psychiatrists. This is forcing companies to come alongside and offer help to executives addicted to buying stuff online. Dr Manoj Kumar Sharma, additional professor, department of clinical psychology, NIMHANS, Bangalore. About 4.7% of female respondents and 3.5% of male respondents admitted to online shopping addiction in a NIMHANS study of 2,750 people in the age group of 18-65 years. The study was funded by Indian Council of Medical Research, Delhi. Every day, Sameer Malhotra, who heads the department of mental health & behavioural sciences at Max Healthcare, treats at least two patients struggling with compulsive online shopping disorders.

Leading multinational corporations are seeking de-addiction and counselling assistance for their employees, companies that provide such assistance say. Optum International recently did a workshop for two leading multinationals in India. Each workshop is facilitated by a psychologist, who advises participants on behavioural aspects, and a financial analyst, who advises them on budgeting and shopping responsibly without going overboard. These are typically 90-minute sessions with 30-35 participants. Counselling sessions are also offered at the end of such de-addiction sessions. Typical signs of online shopping addiction include loss of self-control, ignoring other tasks, binges of buying unnecessary products followed by stressed finances and guilt. Max Healthcare's Malhotra. "It sometimes boils down to keeping them under supervision or keeping away plastic money from them," he adds. Online retailers claim to be unaware of this syndrome.

Check Price for "Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large". Hi. Are you looking for Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large? You can buy Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large in online store and check price. We think you find Low Price and Best buy Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large Shops & Purchase Online - Secure Check out. 4.5 stars and 31 reviews on this site only! Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large : Image. Thanks for your visit our website. Hopefully you will satisfied with Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large. Online shopping in Bahrain click to Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large For Check prices here. Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large on us price. You can Buy Flowers by 1800Flowers Healing Tears Red, White and Blue Large Online Store.

Internet shopping is a phenomena that is growing rapidly nowadays. A peep into the exponential growth of the main players in this industry indicates there is still a large reservoir of market potential for e-commerce. The conveniency of online shopping rendering it an emerging trend among consumers, especially the Gen Y. The prevalence of online shopping has raised the interest of the retailers to focus on this area. Therefore, this study was to determine the relationship between subjective norm, perceived usefulness and online shopping behavior while mediated by purchase intention. University students aged between 18 and 34 that currently pursuing their studies in University Malaysia Perlis were selected as the subject of analysis.

662 out of 800 sets of questionnaires distributed were valid for coding, analyzing and testing the hypothesis. Collected data were then analyzed using SPSS version 18.0 and AMOS version 16.0. Structural Equation Modeling to examine the model fits and hypothesis testing. The conclusion can be depicted that subjective norm and perceived usefulness significant positively influence online purchase intention but subjective norm insignificant influence shopping behavior in a negative way. It is interesting to note that perceived usefulness also insignificantly influence online shopping behavior. Finding also revealed that purchase intention significant positively influence online shopping behavior. For future research, sample from working adults and other variables that related to online shopping were to be included to minimise sampling bias.

Holiday shopping online can be irresistible. This year, 83 percent of U.S. What’s not to love? You make a list, check it twice, then go wild. Such joy. Until you land on a bogus retail website or your credit card information gets swiped. Here’s the gift you can really use: tips for safer holiday online shopping. Consider this: In 2017, the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center received nearly 300,000 online-theft complaints. 1.4 billion. That’ll put a dent in your budget. Meanwhile, online shopping is forecast to boom during the 2018 holiday season, according to eMarketer, a research company that provides insights related to commerce and marketing in the digital world. Here’s what the agency predicts for November 1 to December 31, when nearly a quarter of annual online buying happens.

0 notes

sydneysageivashkov · 7 years ago

Text

Buried With Our Past (4/4)

Sydney and Adrian have had five years of peace, living happily ever after with their adopted son and extended family.

And then a spirit experiment goes very wrong, and Sydney wakes up in Russia, seven years earlier. The Alchemists might think they control her, but Sydney’s got a family to reunite.

Parts 1, 2, 3 | AO3

Jill startled as a tray was dropped on to the table next to her with a large clatter. She looked up to see Eddie sitting down beside her.

“So, you’ve been mysteriously absent from Adrian’s room over the past week,” said Eddie. “And Rose’s. And Lissa’s, and -”

Jill snorted, and Eddie looked very pleased with himself. “I get the picture,” she said. “I haven’t had a fight with Adrian or anything. It’s just…” She paused, then nodded in the direction of the table where Rose, Lissa and Christian were eating with Avery. “Avery Lazar’s a spirit user. She almost got Lissa killed last time. We have a plan to deal with her, but we still need to wait a bit to get all the supplies.”

“So you’re – what? Back up?” asked Eddie. Jill stole one of his fries and he whacked at her hand with the flat of his knife. She grinned up at him, and it felt so achingly like it used to that she could have kissed him.

“Yeah,” she said instead, because kissing him would definitely go against the relationship spoilers rule. “I can use the bond to tell if Adrian’s being compelled, and since I’m not hanging out with them, Avery doesn’t know to compel me.”

“It’s a good plan,” said Eddie, nodding to himself. “And you’ve definitely got a way to stop her?”

“Not definitely, but I trust Sydney to come through for us,” said Jill. “She’s never let us down before.”

“So will we finally get to meet the mysterious Sydney?” asked Eddie. “I mean, Rose has met her, and I know she’s a human, but somehow you’ve all been pretty elusive about her.”

Jill smiled sadly. “It’s not just romantic relationships that fall under the spoilers rule, you know.”

“You know that Rose has been trying to work out your future ever since you guys came back? She’s got, like, the cork board with all these dates and names pinned to it like in a detective movie,” said Eddie. “Some of her theories sounds pretty reasonable. Other stuff seems like reaching.”

Jill laughed. She hadn’t know, but knowing Rose, it wasn’t a surprise, either. “I hope you’re not using this as a way to get spoilers out of me.”

“I would never,” said Eddie, trying to look indignant.

They sat silently for a few minutes. Jill watched over her friends with Avery as subtly as she could, and she could tell that Eddie was doing the same. Well, doing much better at it, to be honest. Guardians were actually trained in surveillance.

“With Rose’s cork board,” said Eddie at last, “she has this one theory.” He turned to look at her. Jill looked down at her food. “About you and me.”

Jill looked back up. “You know I can’t say either way.”

“Look, I know why you and Adrian decided not to say anything. I get your reasoning,” said Eddie. “But it’s pretty obvious to everyone that Lissa and Christian stayed together in your future, and that hasn’t affected them at all. If anything, it’s made them more sickeningly sweet than ever.”

“What are you trying to say?” asked Jill.

“Well, I’ve already worked out that we were together in the future,” said Eddie. “And we worked, right?” Jill nodded, hesitantly, and he continued. “So I was wondering if we should just – try. I know I’m not the Eddie you had a few months ago, but I wasn’t really expecting to be in a relationship with a long-lost Dragomir princess, so I figure we’re kind of even there.” Jill couldn’t help a giggle bubbling out, and Eddie smiled at her. “If it works, then we’ve got a few extra years we didn’t have in your future.”

Jill sat for a moment, wondering. Eddie was right. If he knew about their future relationship, then the development of their relationship had already been disrupted, not to mention the fact that she was a different Jill to the one he had initially fallen in love with in her timeline.

But what if she lost him? What if Eddie wasn’t ready yet, and this ended badly, and she lost him forever? She wasn’t sure if she could bear it.

Eddie was looking at her, as firm and steadfast as he always was. Slowly, she leant forwards and kissed him on the cheek. “I’d like that.”

Sydney tapped at the table anxiously at the table as she waited for Mrs Terwilliger to pick up her phone. It was the Amberwood lunch hour, so Mrs Terwilliger should be available. Sydney, meanwhile, didn’t have nearly so much free time. She had managed to get away from the rest of their family by claiming she was going for a coffee run, but it would only be matter of time before someone started wondering why she was taking so long. Abruptly, the ringing cut off as the line picked up.

“Jaclyn Terwilliger speaking,” said the voice at the other end. Sydney’s heart ached at the sound of her old teacher’s voice.

“Mrs Terwilliger, my name is Sydney Sage, and I need some advice on spells relating to vampire magic,” said Sydney, trying to make herself sound as professional as possible.

“I’m sorry?” said Mrs Terwilliger.

“I was wondering if you knew of any spells that could prevent a vampire from using their magic,” explained Sydney. “I know there are spells that can prevent a vampire from wielding their magic on oneself, but I wanted to know if there are any ways to cut off the magic at its source, as it were.”

“That’s not what I meant,” said Mrs Terwilliger. “I quite understood your inquiry. I would rather know who you are and how you came by my number.” Her voice was sharp. Sydney just barely kept herself from sighing.

“My name is Sydney Sage,” she repeated. “As for how I got your number, I had a magical accident and ended up seven years in the past. I know your number because you gave it to me a few months from now.” There was silence on the other end. Sydney continued, a tinge of desperation entering her voice, “You have six cats. You work at Amberwood Prep as a history teacher, and you have a boy named Trey Juarez in your class, who’s brighter than he lets on a lot of the time. You’re a part of the Stelle, and so was your sister before she became too interested in dark magic and you drove her off.”

There was so much more she knew about Mrs Terwilliger that she could mention. Mrs Terwilliger had been one of the great shaping influences of Sydney’s life. “I should hope that your beliefs are your beliefs,” she had once told Sydney, and it had taken a long time, and a lot of work with her and Adrian and everyone else Sydney loved for that to become true.

But Mrs Terwilliger cut her off. “You’re telling the truth,” she said slowly. “I wasn’t aware of any spells that could cause time travel.”

Sydney winced. “It wasn’t exactly human magic.”

There was a pause on the other end. “I imagine this is why you would like to cut off a vampire’s magic? To prevent this from happening again?”

“No, actually,” said Sydney. “I trust the person who did it. It’s for a rogue spirit user.” She explained the situation with Avery Lazar briefly.

“I’m not certain of any such spells,” said Mrs Terwilliger, when Sydney finished. “I will do my research tonight. I can email you any spells I find,” she offered.

“No!” exclaimed Sydney. “No,” she repeated, more calmly. “I can’t – well, I just can’t have any evidence of my magic available. Call me back and I’ll write the spell down.”

“If you’re certain,” said Mrs Terwilliger. “Are you safe, Miss Sage? Do you need help?”

“I’m as safe as I can be,” said Sydney. “I’ll be able to get out of here soon. Only a few more days,” she finished, largely to herself.

There was the familiar sound of the Amberwood bell on the other end of the phone. “Unfortunately, duty calls,” said Mrs Terwilliger, sounding genuinely disappointed to cut the call short. Sydney wasn’t surprised. This was probably the most interesting and confounding thing that had happened to Mrs Terwilliger in a long time.

“It’s fine, Mrs Terwilliger,” she said, and hesitated. “Keep an eye out for Trey, please? His family is… bad, and I don’t think I’ll be in a position to help him this time around.”

“I will do my best,” said Mrs Terwilliger. “I’ll let you know my findings as soon as I can.”

“Soooo,” said a voice behind Adrian, and he almost groaned. He turned to face Avery Lazar, who was watching him with one hand on her waist and her hip popped out. “I always heard that Adrian Ivashkov was the life of every party. What happened, man?”

Adrian could feel the tingle of compulsion, the will that was not his own pushing him towards parties. He pushed back at it with spirit. Avery’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly. She’d been like this since the start, but seemed to have put Adrian’s and Lissa’s resistance down to their spirit use and had taken it as a challenge.

It was especially awful, because without the compulsion and trying-to-kill-innocent-people thing, Avery Lazar was just the kind of person who would have been up twenty-one-year-old Adrian’s alley. She wouldn’t necessarily have been a good influence on him, but he would have liked her genuinely, without the compulsion. But in her quest for power, she’d left behind everything that could make her a likable person and replaced it with compulsion.

“Unfortunately,” said Adrian, drawing the word out, “I’ve got to be a role model to Lissa. Aunt Tatiana wants me to be the ‘positive counterbalance’ to Christian.”

Avery laughed, clear and bright. Adrian tried not to grit his teeth. “Man, how’d you convince her you’re a good influence?”

“No idea,” said Adrian. “Half the school still thinks I’m dating Rose.”

“Oh, yeah, I heard that,” said Avery. Her grin was all teeth. “Heard some sophomores saying you two had eloped.”

“I do love Vegas,” said Adrian, which was probably the only honest thing he was going to say for the entire conversation. Vegas held some fond memories: Sydney looking beautiful in her dress, bouquet in hands, rings on her fingers. “But alas, elopement is not on the cards for Rose and I.” After all, he was happily married (ironically, because of an elopement), and she was hopelessly in love with a Russian warlord, who was either dead or an undead mobster. You know, normal relationship obstacles.

“She doesn’t seem to like me that much,” noted Avery. Adrian only just managed to bite back a comment about how nobody there liked her.

“Rose is very possessive of what she considers hers,” explained Adrian, because it was a better reason than any of the real ones.

“So she does like you?” asked Avery, cocking her head. Adrian wondered if she was now planning how best to get rid of Rose.

“She’s more possessive of Lissa than of me,” said Adrian. “They’ve been best friends since they were kids, and Rose is in line to be her guardian.” Honestly, that wouldn’t extend Rose’s life expectancy in Avery’s mind, but he had faith in Rose’s abilities to punch her way out of any situation.

“Yeah, aren’t they bonded?” asked Avery. “Like in the stories?” Avery was very good at faking curiousity: she had cocked her head ever so slightly and widened her eyes a little. Adrian nodded and she sighed longingly. “I wish I could have that. Simon’s okay, but it’d be pretty great to have my best friend as my bonded guardian.”

Unbelievable. She was effectively saying that her brother and guardian just weren’t good enough. Rose and Lissa were still finding a way to balance out the bond so that Lissa had her privacy and they both had their sanity. Adrian and Jill had spent a long time working out how to maintain their privacy and keep Adrian’s vices from affecting Jill. Most of the time, they didn’t even bother trying to balance out the bond; they just blocked it with medication. If Avery actually cared about either of her bondmates, she would know all of that, and wouldn’t be making that comment, even as a cover.

“Yeah, well, it’s not all of a bed of roses,” said Adrian, trying to keep the edge out of his voice.

“I see what you did there,” said Avery with a smirk. Adrian blinked. He hadn’t even noticed. “Come on, let’s go find Lissa and see if we can spring her from her disapproving keeper.”

“Sorry, I can’t,” said Adrian, pushing back against the compulsion. “Got a – thing. Got a thing. And Lissa’s got an exam coming up, so she won’t do anything either.”

Avery frowned minutely before it was wiped away by an easy smile. “All good. Let me know when you’re finally willing to let loose,” she said, with a flirty flip of her hair and a quick pulse of compulsion.

Not likely. “Will do.”

The house was silent. It was close to one in the morning, and the rest of Sydney’s family was sleeping. She slid out of her bed, casting a spell to keep her movements silent.

Her father’s office was well-organised and when it came to most subjects, it was simple to find the relevant files. Sydney knew that her task wouldn’t be so easy.

She closed the door behind her before she turned the computer on. She turned the brightness down to its lowest possible setting to be safe. She started clicking through all the folders that seemed like they would usually be considered irrelevant.

It took forty minutes, located on a hard drive that she found hidden behind the book shelf, amidst a folder filled with bureaucratic but Proper Alchemist things. Sydney guessed that her father was banking on anyone searching through the hard drive to dismiss it after only a few of the bureaucratic files. But there it was: evidence of her father’s illegal smuggling of vampire blood and saliva to the Warriors of the Light. There was even enough mentions of all his co-conspirators to bring them down with him. There was evidence of monetary transactions, of the Moroi that they were taking blood from (Sydney’s heart ached when she saw Clarence’s name amongst them), and interaction with the Warriors. It was enough.

She set about printing paper copies of the files. Sydney would take the hard drive with her, too, but it wouldn’t hurt to have physical copies in addition to the digital files. She felt tears pricking at her eyes. After a month and a half of living under the Alchemists’ thumb once more, she was so, so close to freedom.

“Sydney?”

Sydney whirled around to see her father standing in the doorway. He was staring at her, face uncomprehending but suspicious. “What are you doing?”

Sydney decided to go on the offensive. “What are you doing?” she demanded, brandishing some of the printed pages at him. “You’re selling vampire blood! That goes against everything the Alchemists stand for!”

Jared narrowed his eyes at her and stepped forwards. “How did you know about this?” Sydney opened her mouth to deny it, but he pushed on. “It’s after midnight. You crept in here after we were all asleep. You didn’t just stumble on it. You came looking for it.”

Sydney set her jaw. “I did know about it,” she said. She stepped forward, glaring at her father. “A month and a half ago, I woke up in the past. I woke up living under the Alchemists with no way out. But I knew I just had to get back here and get evidence of your dealings and I could use that to go free.”

“Woke up in the past?” repeated Jared, and scoffed. “Impossible.”

“Possible, with the help of magic,” said Sydney forcefully. “That’s right. Magic. Spirit magic, to be precise. This is how it’s going to work, Dad,” she said, almost spitting out the last word. “I’m going to wake up tomorrow morning. I’m going to say goodbye to Mum and Carly and Zoe – not forever, just until the next time I see them, because I will see them again. I’m going to disappear from the Alchemists radar, and you are going to keep me off the Alchemists’ radar, or I’ll bust you and all my friends.” She smirked bitterly at him. “We’ll both go to re-education, but I guarantee that I can escape re-education. Can you say the same?”

“No one can escape re-education,” said Jared. “You’re putting yourself on the path there, though, with this casual talk of Moroi magic and threatening a direct superior.”

That’s how he saw himself: as a direct superior. Not her father – a superior. It summed up Jared Sage pretty well.

“I can escape re-education. I’ve done it before,” she said, and smirked as her father’s eyes widened. “Thank you, though, for the worst four months of my life. I never got the chance to say that in the other timeline. You really won Father of the Year award that year.”

“Whatever I did, I would have done to save your soul,” said Jared, loftily.

“Save my soul? Do you know what they do in re-education?” she demanded. Angry tears stung at her eyes, and she balled her fists, willing them back. If she cried, he would dismiss her as an overly-emotional teenage girl. She wasn’t a girl, though. She was a woman grown who hadn’t needed her father in years, a woman who finally understood the many ways Jared Sage had failed her.

She was a mother, and she couldn’t understand how any parent could do to their child what her father had done to her.

“First they keep you in darkness for days,” she continued. “No food. No clothes. Just a voice talking at you about how you sinned. And when you finally pass that stage – and that took me three weeks – you move on to the actual ‘re-education’.” She took a step forward. “It’s all propaganda. If you talk back, if you point out the flaws in their logic, if you do anything but parrot back the Alchemist party line, you get sent away. They make you sick for hours. They turn everyone in there – all of the victims – against each other and encourage them to report infractions so that you have no support system. And that’s only for the minor things. If you talk back too much, they send you for re-inking, and you come back a zombie.”

“Better that than allowing you to stray from the light,” said Jared. His tone was full of self-righteousness and Sydney wanted to scream.

“The light? You raised me to follow orders no matter the morality behind them. You taught me not to think for myself; to let the Alchemists think for me. Every time the tattoo gets touched up, you get compelled to follow their orders. It’s disgusting,” snarled Sydney. “They take away our agency without a second thought. At least the Moroi see compulsion as a taboo! You talk as if they’re evil creatures of the night but at least they respect my free will!”

Her voice had risen to a shout. In the hallway, behind Jared, she could see her sisters’ heads peeking out from their rooms, and at the end was her mother, staring in horror.

“That’s not even going into how awful you are as a father,” she continued. “Your comments caused me to have an eating disorder for years so I could be as thin as a Moroi. Guess what, Dad? I’m not a Moroi. I’m human! You brought Keith Darnell into our house and -” She broke off, seeing Carly’s eyes widen and her head shake. Sydney reigned in her fury. If Carly didn’t want what he did known, then Sydney wouldn’t betray her because she was angry. “- And you loved him more than you ever did us. You’d happily send me to re-education, to have everything that makes me me dug out and replaced by Alchemist propaganda.

“I’m done with you, and I’m done with the Alchemists,” said Sydney, voice deadly quiet. “I have enough information to put you through everything I just described. You keep me off their radar, I won’t give them what I know. You keep Zoe and Carly out, and I won’t give them what I know. Do we understand each other?”

Jared was staring at her. She met his eyes with a steady gaze. She would not be backing down. She would not blink first.

At last, Jared nodded. “Understood.”

The Academy’s van was crowded. Adrian wasn’t entirely sure how Lissa had convinced the new headmaster and Alberta that she had to go to Missoula on such short notice, and that Adrian, Christian, Jill, and Eddie all had to be part of the group, but she’d managed it somehow. He suspected that mild compulsion may have been involved.

“Is everything ready?” asked Rose in an undertone, sliding in next to Adrian.

Adrian nodded. “Sydney’s going to meet us there. Just find a way to get us away from the guardians and we’ll be fine.” He was so, so close to seeing Sydney again.

Rose nodded. “That, I can do.”

“Rose,” he said, and faltered. She looked at him steadily. “Thank you for getting Sydney home early.”

Rose softened, some of the hardened guardian persona giving way to his friend. “It was the least I could do,” she replied. “You, Jill, Sydney – you always seem really sad. If getting Sydney back to the US and out of danger a little sooner could help, then there wasn’t much of a choice.”

He spent most of the drive sitting in silence. His thoughts were ahead, with the woman that was waiting for them in Missoula. There had been phone calls, and even a few dream visits when he had managed to convince her that he wasn’t using too much spirit. But this was going to be real.

The only one who had any idea of exactly what he was feeling was Jill, but she was seated in the row behind him, talking quietly with Eddie. He hoped that everything worked out there. Jill and Eddie had been a good match in the last timeline, and he couldn’t see why they wouldn’t be now.

Since Rose and Eddie were both the same age as the rest of the teenagers, they were quickly placed on near guard duty by the other guardians. It was convenient, as they were the only ones amongst the guardians who knew the true reasons behind the trip, and it would be harder to slip near guards than far guards. Adrian followed the others into a store, and as if on an unspoken cue, Christian immediately started talking to Avery loudly and Lissa used the distraction to slip something into Adrian’s hand. She flashed him a quick wink before she went to join her boyfriend and Avery.

“Get Sydney. We’ll meet you downstairs,” said Rose, under her breath, before she also left. Adrian opened his hand to find a silver ring. He could sense a notice-me-not compulsion on it and he slipped it on, hurrying out of the store.

He found Sydney in the bookstore. She hadn’t noticed him yet. She was reading the blurb of a thick book with a photo of the Colosseum on the front, her eyebrows knit together as she concentrated. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

Sydney looked up, eyes flicking around nervously, as if she had realised she was being watched. Her eyes landed on him, and her mouth opened a little. She placed the book back on the shelf and approached.

Her hand rested on his cheek, trembling a little. Her eyes were shining with tears. “You’re here,” she whispered. “You’re really here.”

He pulled her into a hug. She rested her head on his shoulder, and her chest shook under his hands. “In the flesh, Sage,” he said. “I’m not leaving you ever again.”

She smiled, a few, stray tears running down her face. “I’m pretty sure that would be physically impossible.”

“Nope,” he said. “Screw physics. I’m not going anywhere.” She laughed, the sound bubbling out of her almost hysterically.

“We’re free,” she said, like she couldn’t quite believe it. “I almost forgot what it was like.”

He leant down and kissed her, softly. Her lips felt warm and familiar under his, the way she wound one hand through his hair. He had missed this, missed her, like a missing limb. It felt like coming home.

She pulled away and rested her forehead against his. “Where are the others?” she asked.

Sydney Sage-Ivashkov: always on track, even in a situation like this. “Downstairs, in the carpark,” he said. “They should be slipping the guardians as we speak.”

She took another deep breath. “We should go to them,” she said regretfully, pulling away.

Adrian sighed. “You’re right, as always.” She took his hand and smiled.

“As always.”

The carpark was still empty when they arrived, so they leant against the Academy’s van and talked about the past two months.

“So I yelled at him about awful he and the Alchemists are, and blackmailed him into letting me go,” finished Sydney. She grinned up at him, and Adrian felt his breath hitch. “We’re free.”

Adrian leant down to kiss her, but before he could, the doors opened and the others spilled out. Avery looked confused, but not worried. That would probably change soon.

“You guys here?” called Rose, looking round the carpark. Sydney pushed herself off the van and tugged Adrian behind her, stepping out into view. Jill broke out of the group and ran towards them. Sydney let go of Adrian’s hand to meet Jill halfway. The two crashed into each other and clung on, crying and laughing.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Jill said, so quietly Adrian almost didn’t catch it. “I’m missed you so much.”

Sydney was crying. “I missed you, too, Jill.”

“What’s going on?” asked Avery. She looked suspicious, like she had finally caught on to the fact that she was missing something big.

Sydney let go of Jill and dug through her handbag. She pulled out a package wrapped in plain, white cloth. “I’m guessing that’s Avery?” she asked Jill, who nodded.

“Who are you?” demanded Avery.

Sydney held the package up. “I’m Sydney Ivashkov. I hear you’ve been moving in on my husband,” she said. Avery gaped, and Sydney started chanting. Adrian didn’t understand it, but he’d been around Sydney long enough to recognise Latin when he heard it.

Avery, who apparently was also capable of recognising threatening Latin chanting when she heard it, tried to back up, but Rose grabbed hold of her and held her in place.

“I’ve got her, Sydney,” she said. Sydney flashed her a grin as she finished the chanting, as she unwrapped the package. The mixture inside lifted itself up and floated to Avery, showering over her.

Besides Lissa, Adrian was the only person in the group who could see exactly what was happening. Avery’s aura shimmered, cycling through all the colours of the rainbow. The gold that Avery had been hiding burst into view, as did the dark shadows that Adrian usually associated with Rose. Even two bondmates apparently could not keep up with the amount of spirit darkness. The rainbow that had been flowing through Avery’s aura suddenly coalesced into a solid barrier around her aura.

“It’s done,” he confirmed to the others.

“Let go of me,” snarled Avery. Adrian could see the spirit welling up in her aura, could see her trying to force her will on to the others, but it hit the rainbow barrier and rebounded inwards. Avery’s eyes widened, panic setting in. “What have you done to me?”

“Ensured that you aren’t going to hurt anybody ever again,” said Lissa, stepping forwards.

“Moroi magic is intrinsic,” explained Sydney. “I can’t stop you from using it entirely. But I could create a barrier between you and other people.” Avery glowered at her.

And then the door burst open. Avery’s guardian, Simon, came marching through.

“I thought she was meant to be cut off from everyone else!” exclaimed Jill. Rose and Eddie were already walking forward to engage Simon.

“This spell was designed to cut Strigoi off from compulsion. It’s never been used on someone with a bond before,” said Sydney. “I guess we shouldn’t be surprised there were side effects.”

Rose and Eddie had reached Simon. Simon swung a fist at Rose, which she dodged and caught his hand. “Trying to attack Moroi,” mocked Rose, tutting. “That’s not very guardian-like.” Simon grunted and pulled his hand from Rose’s grip, just in time to block an attack from Eddie.

Rose and Eddie were making ground on Simon when Rose blanched, face growing pale. Eddie glanced over at Rose, worried, giving Simon an opportunity to land a solid hit on Eddie that left Eddie staggering. Simon began to walk towards them again.

The doors opened, and Adrian saw the Academy’s guardians enter the car park, Alberta at their hand. They took in the situation in a few seconds, and went after Simon.

But Rose beat them to it. She swung a leg around, knocking Simon’s out from under him. He fell and she followed him to the ground, holding him down. “You aren’t ever going to hurt Lissa,” she hissed at him.

Alberta reached the two and Rose handed Simon over to her. “We have to get out of here,” she said. “Right now. They’re coming.”

Adrian would have asked who ‘they’ were, but there was only one reason Rose would have stumbled in that fight, only one reason she would be as pale as she was. Alberta, however, didn’t know about Rose’s early warning system and stopped to ask what she meant.

Honestly, even if Alberta had given orders to evacuate immediately, it wouldn’t have made much of a difference. They would have had a few extra seconds at most. Because as soon as Alberta had finished asking, a cold voice spoke up behind Adrian, all the more chilling for its familiarity.

“Hello, Roza.”

Sydney had seen Strigoi before. She had even felt Strigoi fangs at her throat, certain she was about to die. Seeing a Strigoi she knew shouldn’t have made so much of a difference.

Dimitri’s skin was deathly pale, looking chalky under his dark brown hair. The red in his eyes made her want to throw up.

Once, she had stood beside him and listened as he pretended to be a Strigoi. That, in itself, had been awful. But seeing the real deal? It was unimaginably worse. She could barely imagine how Rose must have felt, the first time she saw him.

“I told you I’d come for you when you stepped outside the Academy’s gates,” said Dimitri. Rose pushed her way past the other guardians, placing herself between Dimitri and all of the Moroi. “And yet, here you are.”

Rose looked him in the eye, and then punched him in the face. It was enough to spur everyone into action: the guardians moved forwards, engaging the three Strigoi that Dimitri had brought with him.

Sydney grabbed Christian’s arm. “We need to subdue him before someone kills him,” she said. “I’m going to throw a fireball at him. Make it surround him, okay?” Christian nodded, and she summoned the flame to her hand. She kept it in a small, tight ball, and threw it at Dimitri’s feet, careful to avoid Rose. Both of them startled as the flames grew rapidly into an inferno, and suddenly Eddie was there, dragging Rose back. Christian waved his hand, and the fire surrounded Dimitri.

“Cover me!” shouted Lissa, drawing a stake from her bag. She didn’t look at all capable of taking on a Strigoi, let alone Dimitri, but the look in her eyes was determined.

Rose and Eddie fell back to Lissa’s side, guarding her against any Strigoi. Dimitri seemed too distracted by the flames to even notice the princess approaching, until she had grasped the stake with both hands and plunged it into his chest.

Well, sort of. The stake didn’t go the entire way in. Lissa gritted her teeth and threw her entire weight behind the stake, inching it in a little further. Dimitri struggling against the stake and the flames made her job that much harder.

Sydney knew when Lissa succeeded because the room flooded with light. She felt the spirit magic flow, the feeling of life and love and laughter bursting outwards. Sydney had seen a Strigoi be restored once before. Dimitri’s restoration was no less beautiful than Sonya’s had been.

As the light receded, Sydney had to blink several times in order to see again. Dimitri was on the ground, his head in Lissa’s lap, Rose holding his hand like it was a life line. And Dimitri was weeping.

Strigoi and guardians, however, were hard to distract. A miracle had just taken place, but the fighting restarted quickly enough. One Strigoi was staked, then a second. Eddie staked the third as he tried to approach his former boss.

“What just happened?” asked one guardian. From what Sydney could tell, she appeared to be the leader of the guardians. She went to approach Dimitri, Rose and Lissa, but Jill threw herself between them.

“He’s a dhampir!” exclaimed Jill. “Lissa turned D – Guardian Belikov back into a dhampir.”

“It’s true,” said Adrian, joining her. “I felt the spirit Lissa was wielding. It worked. Belikov’s a dhampir.”

“That’s impossible,” scoffed another guardian.

“I can run some tests,” Sydney offered, slipping back into her role of professional Alchemist.

The leader focused on her. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

“That’s not important,” said Adrian, immediately. From the way the guardian’s face slackened a little, Sydney could tell that Adrian had used some mild compulsion on her. “What is important, Guardian Petrov, is that a miracle just happened. Lissa just restored a Strigoi to life. Spirit can save people from being a Strigoi! Imagine what could be done with this.”

“If you can prove he really is a dhampir,” said Guardian Petrov. She glanced at Dimitri, hope entering her expression.

“Take him back to the Academy,” said Christian. “If he gets through the wards, then he’s not a Strigoi, right?”

“Right,” said Adrian. “There’s your proof.”

“We can’t take him back to the Academy!” exclaimed one guardian, horrified. “There are children there.”

“He’s harmless!” snapped Adrian. “Well, as harmless as a trained guardian can be. There’s no Strigoi left.”

Guardian Petrov looked at Dimitri again. Sydney wasn’t sure if he, Lissa or Rose had heard any part of the conversation that was going on above them. Rose and Lissa were murmuring to Dimitri in soothing tones, their words too quiet to make out.

“We’ll take him back to Saint Vladimir’s,” she decided. “There are cells we can hold him in until we decide if he’s safe.” She looked at another guardian. “Call the school. Send back up. We can’t transport him with the students.”

Adrian slid away from the ensuing conversation and came to stand before her. “I should go back with them until we can convince them that Dimitri’s a dhampir.”

Sydney nodded. “I know. They need you.”

It wasn’t safe to kiss, not with so many unknown quantities around, but Adrian risked placing a hand on her cheek. “I’ll come for you as soon as I can,” he promised.

Jill approached. Her hand was twined with Eddie’s, but she let go to throw her arms around Sydney. “It’s not fair that you have to leave again so soon,” said Jill into Sydney’s hair.

“It’ll be fine soon enough, Jill,” said Sydney, brushing Jill’s hair down. She squeezed Jill once and let go to look at Eddie.

“Did you come back, too?” she asked, uncertainly. Jill and Adrian hadn’t mentioned it, and surely Eddie would have wanted to speak with her before now. But he and Jill had been holding hands…

“No,” said Eddie, shaking his head and rubbing the back of his neck. “Sorry. I know we were close in your future.”

“I’m going to hug you anyway,” Sydney decided.

“I’m always up for a hug,” agreed Eddie. Sydney wrapped her arms around Eddie and leant her head against his shoulder. Eddie was the closest thing she had ever had to a brother, and she had missed him desperately.

But time was running short, so she let go of Eddie to look back to Adrian. “I love you,” she whispered, blinking back tears.

“I love you, too,” said Adrian. She took his hand and stared at him, drinking him in for as long as she dared.

The arguments were dying down, though, and she reluctantly pulled away, walking away before anyone could notice her.

News of a restored Strigoi spread throughout the Moroi world in a matter of days.

Two days after Dimitri was restored, three high-ranking guardians and another two magical researchers arrived at Saint Vladimir’s to investigate. With them, came the queen.

“You told me this would happen,” she told Adrian, quietly. “I did not fully believe you until the news came.”

“What do people think back at court?” he asked. “A lot of people were convinced it was a trick last time.”

“It’s the same now,” said Aunt Tatiana. She looked very tired. “Others believe it. They think of Vasilisa as some kind of goddess: the princess from a dying family, working miracles that could save our species.”

“They’re not wrong,” said Adrian. “We were getting lose to finding a vaccine last time. If we ever succeed, then it’s only a matter of time before the Strigoi die out.”

Tatiana stood and looked at her stone-faced guardian. “Take us to Belikov,” she ordered.

Dimitri wasn’t in the Academy’s holding cells at that moment. It was early in the Moroi night, or early morning for the human world. The sun had risen only an hour ago, and he was sitting at a picnic table near the guardians’ quarters. Lissa sat on one side of him and Rose on the other, with half a dozen of the school’s guardians watching him intently.

Adrian still wasn’t sure what had happened in Russia, either time, but evidently Rose had changed enough that Dimitri was not as violently opposed to seeing her as he had been last time round. Adrian had barely seen Rose or Lissa since they had returned from Missoula. Any free time they had had been spent fighting to convince others that Dimitri was no longer a Strigoi and to get him released from custody.

Tatiana swept towards the three, and several guardians followed her. Adrian rolled his eyes at them as he and Aunt Tatiana sat down across the table from the princess and guardians. Somehow, Tatiana was capable of making even the picnic table look like a throne. Lissa and Dimitri both bowed their heads.

“You’re not here to yell at me again, are you?” asked Rose, looking at Tatiana dubiously. After a belated paused, she added, “Uh, Your Majesty.”

“Rose!” admonished Lissa and Dimitri in unison. Rose ducked her head but Adrian spotted the smile as she did so. She had probably been playing dumb on purpose, he thought – trying to break the tension.

“Indeed not, Miss Hathaway,” said Tatiana, not even bothering to conceal her amusement. “I came to talk to Mr Belikov. If you have been truly restored, then it could change our entire world, so I wished to make my own judgements.” Rose bristled a little at Dimitri being addressed as ‘Mr Belikov’ rather than as ‘Guardian Belikov’, but was quelled by a sharp look from Lissa.

Dimitri bowed his head. “I am at your command, Your Majesty.”

“Then we shall begin,” said Tatiana, and started her interrogation.

It took another three weeks for Adrian to meet Sydney at their decided place in Maine.

“Are you ready for this?” he asked her. He didn’t think he was.

“I don’t think we can start living our life together unless we do this,” she replied. “We need to put the other timeline to rest.”

He nodded and pulled her into a hug. She clung on to him tightly, burying her face in his shoulder. They stood for several long moments before she let go.

“Here,” said Sydney, handing him a charmed necklace. She put one on herself and spoke a few words in Latin. The spell was meant to turn them invisible to anyone who didn’t know they were there. He had a lot of faith in Sydney’s abilities, but it was a little nerve-wracking when he couldn’t actually see if the spell had worked or not.

Their old house was still being lived in by the people they had bought it off, so they made their way through to the back garden as silently as they could. There was a large tree in the corner of the yard. It didn’t have the tree house that it’d had in their time, but it was the only place they thought of as Declan’s that they could get to.

Sydney knelt at the foot of the tree and placed her hand on it. “I love you,” she whispered. “I love how you’d say that every movie that wasn’t animated was boring, I love how you still hadn’t gotten your tongue around ‘Ivashkov’, I love how -” Her voice cracked. Adrian knelt beside her and put his hand on her shoulder. She took a deep breath, wiping away a tear. “I love how you always want a cuddle and insist on a story before bed.” She stopped again, crying in earnest now. Adrian wrapped his arms around her and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

“I don’t know if you’ll ever exist in this timeline,” he said to the tree, to the life they had once built, to Declan, “but I’m always going to love you. You will always be my first child, no matter what happens in this life.”

Sydney was still sniffling when she took the small plant of rosemary from her bag. She made a shallow depression in the earth with her hands and placed the rosemary in it, pushing the dirt back into place. “For remembrance,” she said. “You’ll always be in our hearts.”

Adrian placed his hand on the rosemary plant, feeling the spirit surge through him. The plant grew in size, purple flowers blooming on it.

“Goodbye, Declan,” he said. Sydney ran her hands along the plant before she let Adrian pull her to her feet.

They returned to the car. Sydney pulled away from the curb and they drove in silence.

“Do you think it ever gets easier?” she asked, at last.

“I don’t know, Sage,” he said, honestly. “But at least we aren’t dealing with it alone anymore.”

Sydney opened the door to find a crowd of faces peering back at her. Their friends had turned out in force for Sydney and Adrian’s second (primarily for legal reasons, because they had never stopped considering themselves married) wedding. Rose grinned gleefully and pulled Sydney into a hug. Most of the others streamed past, greeting Sydney as they went – so far in this timeline, they largely knew Adrian rather than Sydney. She received a quick hug from Eddie as he passed. Only Jill remained on their doorstep, talking into her phone.

“Yes, I know I snuck out of Court – yes, I had a very good reason, and I have Eddie and Rose and Dimitri with me, what do you think is going to happen? – Mum, I am actually twenty-one, remember, I can make my own decisions,” Jill was saying. Sydney tried not to laugh at Jill, who barely looked her biological age of fifteen years. Jill looked up and smiled brilliantly at Sydney. “Gotta go! Sorry,” she said into her phone, then hung up before her mother could argue.

“You snuck out of Court?” inquired Sydney, nodding at the phone Jill was putting in her pocket.

“Do you really think anyone would have let me out?” asked Jill. “Especially my mother! She keeps forgetting that I’m not fourteen.”

“You certainly look the part,” teased Sydney, and Jill laughed, throwing her arms around Sydney.

“I’m so glad I get to be part of this one!” exclaimed Jill. “I was still stranded in Amberwood last time.”

“No Alchemists hunting us this time, so it definitely passes the bar the other timeline set,” said Sydney. “And I’ve got everyone here this time.”

Jill followed Sydney into the main part of the house. Adrian and Sydney had ended up where it had begun for them: they were living on the outskirts of Palm Springs. There was little to no chance of Strigoi attacks, and only one Alchemist to be worried about, and Sydney had more than enough blackmail on Keith.

Sydney’s sisters and mother were sitting on the couch in the living room, looking mildly shell-shocked by the deluge of dhampirs and Moroi who had entered. They were tentatively beginning to accept Adrian, but this was something else. Adrian pulled out of Lissa’s hug, grinning around the room. Sydney’s heart seemed too big for her chest. Almost everyone she loved was in this room.

“Mrs Terwilliger’s here!” said Jill, voice surprised. Sydney glanced at where Mrs Terwilliger was sitting on the love seat, peering at the newcomers like they were science experiments.

“I met up with her when we moved here,” explained Sydney. “I’m spending a lot of time at Spencer’s and I’ve been slowly but steadily befriending Trey. I’m still working on a way to get Angeline out of the Keepers, but I’ll get there eventually.”

“I have no doubt,” said Jill. Eddie reappeared at Jill’s side, sliding an arm around her waist. Sydney smiled. She was glad that they were working out in spite of the time travel shenanigans.

“I hope you’re treating Jill well, Castile,” she said, with mock sternness.

Jill rolled her eyes. “No. You’re not allowed to threaten him. This isn’t how the Melrose family works!”

Eddie looked bewildered. “Melrose family…?”

Adrian approached, kissing Sydney quickly on her forehead. “I believe I heard something about a Melrose family reunion?” he asked, looking at Jill.

Jill snorted. “Oh, man, there’s a lot of fake family incest going on in this house,” she said with a grin. “Imagine if Micah or someone had caught one of us!”

Eddie still looked lost, so Sydney took pity on him. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to my sisters,” she said to him. “You’re pretty much the most normal person here. We’ll ease them into this.”

“Hey, I’m normal!” objected Jill.

“You’re a magic-wielding, time-travelling, long lost princess of a dying line,” deadpanned Adrian. “You’re practically a comic book character.” Jill frowned, but shrugged acceptingly.

“Be nice,” chided Sydney, even as she felt a smile tugging at her lips.

“Always am,” said Adrian, leaning down to kiss Sydney quickly. Rose wolf-whistled loudly across the room, and Dimitri tried to shush her without avail.

It wasn’t where she had expected to be six months ago. It wasn’t the house she had wanted or the life she had built, and the child she had raised was gone. But standing in this room, with so many of her loved ones surrounding her, Sydney was pretty sure there were worse lives she could have lived.

#sydrian #bloodlines #vampire academy #fic #ff.net is playing up ughh #now that this monster is done I can move on to gremma appreciation stuff!#also uni work

1 note · View note

mysticdaddies · 8 years ago

Text

RFA DOGS HC :)

So I decided to do a little collaboration with the beautiful @sketchyy-pencil with using her art as inspiration to write HCS for the cute doggies c: I have her permission to use her art. The drawings are hers and you can find the post HERE with their names HERE

Zen’s Dog: Jun the Siberian Husky

He was hungry for love... hungry for being wanted... hungry for someone to run up to him and welcome him home.... but also... someone to be there for him as a friend.....who looks up to him.... THAT IS WHY HE GOT A DOG. Dogs are loyal, love you unconditionally, will welcome you home, will look up to you, THEY ARE A MANS/WOMENS BEST FRIEND COME ON. He went to a breeder, and found this dog who was being ignored by everyone else. All of its brother and sisters were playing without him and when hew white dog tried to play with them, they growled at him and he walked away. THE FEELS WERE HIT OKAY. ZEN WAS GETTING THOSE FLASHBACKS AND HE RAN TO THE DOG AND HUGGED HIM SAYING THAT HE WILL BE HIS NEW FATHER. He took the puppy home and educated himself on how to take care of a husky.

Look, Zen becomes the way Jumin is with Elizabeth the 3rd. Zen practices his lines with the dog. He got a little care seat on his motorcycle so the dog can go with him to his special place. You do not fuck with his dog. The dog is like an exact replica of Zen. White fur with Red eyes making all the other dogs want to be him or want to be with him. The dog is really there for Zen in a emotional level. They both know how it is to be ignored and not loved. Okay TBH, Jun rarely gets dog food, he gets meat, chicken, ham, all that good stuff. Zen makes sure he runs the the fat off so he doesn't get sick D: He makes sure the dog takes frequent ice baths c: He loves to go to the park and play catch with his doggie. They cant be there for long because of fans wanting to take pictures. BEST BELIEVE THIS DOG IS THERE POSING FOR THE PHOTO

Yoosung’s Dog: Rin the Corgi

Yoosung was tired of feeling lonely all the time and he decided to do something about it. He decided to join a new club at campus and he decided to join the CORGI APPRECIATION SQAUD club. He always wanted to be apart of a squad so he was an active member c: He started to find appreciation to the breed and decided to get one of his own c: The club gave him directions to this adoption center and thats where he met his best friend RIN THE CORGI :,D Rin was Yoosungs hype dog! Yoosung bought LOL shirts for her and everything. He loVES PLAYING WITH HER TINY LITTLE LEGS!!! HE LIKS TO FLICK IT AND SING TO HER WHILE HE RUBS HER BELLY. SHE BRINGS HIM HAPPINESS. LIKE HE BUYS PAJAMAS FOR HER AND EVERYTHING. REASON TO LIVE. REASON TO DO GOOD IN SCHOOL. SHE IS JUST A GOOD GIRL. LOVES TO HUG. SHE TRIPS SOMETIMES BUT ITS OKAY. YOOSUNG PICKS HER UP AND TAPS HER BUT A BIT.

BONUS

HE TOOK HER A SHOWER. HE FILLED HIS TUB HALF WAY. PLOPPED HER IN WITH GOGGLES AND EVERYTHING. HER BUTT FUCKING FLOATED. HE LEGIT CRIED CAUSE IT WAS TOO CUTE.

Saeran’s Dog: Ciel the Doberman

Saeran actually met Ciel in the worst way possible. Ciel was Saerans personal guardian angel.

When Rika manipulated Saeran to join Mint Eye, he wasn't “conditioned” yet. He didnt know what Rika meant by that but 2 months later he was locked in the basement with little food and water. Men wearing white robes and black masks came in the basement and hosed down Saeran leaving him soaked and wet. They have him eat special food 3 times a day and thats all he gets. He doesn't have clothes or a blanket. He just has a mattress and a pillow. He couldn't believe Saeyoung would trade his freedom for his brother. Rika finally was convincing him that Saeyoung left him to die and that he must be cleansed by the lord. “The enemy is the RFA. The stole my happiness away from me. My main target is my own flesh and blood Saeyoung Choi. Mission? To Kill Him.” That was all he was thinking about when he was holding himself in the night trying to spread warmth throughout his body. Later in the night, he heard rapid footsteps around the basement. He thought it was a rat but he rubbed his eyes to try and see better. His vision cleared a bit and he saw a white puppy hiding behind one of the boxes holding bread in its mouth. The puppy looked at Saeran and ran into one of the empty boxes. Saeran went closer to the pups territory and kneeled down extending its hand so the puppy can know Saeran means no harm. The puppy trusted him and from that day on, the dog shared its stolen meal with Saeran and cuddled with him in the night so they both can stay warm.

However one afternoon, the puppy was hiding in its box waiting for nightfall to sneak out and grab food. The puppies nap was rudely interrupted when Rika and her followers barged into the basement to beat up Saeran because they accused him of stealing food. The three masked men were punching and kicking him leaving Saeran defenseless. The puppy didn't think twice leaving his hidden box and went to attack the men. The puppy was biting their legs as if they were pieces of meat protecting his friend. Rika saw what was happening and was about to attack the puppy till Saeran interfered and protected his friend. Saeran finally decided to fully join her and her cult if they let him and his friend live like decent beings. Rika agreed knowing the medicine was now taking affect. She gave them a room and Chef to feed them and everything. From that day on, they were eachs other ride or die.

Jihyun/V’s Dog: Angel the Australian Shepard

Angel traveled around the world with V. She is a very loyal and friendly dog. The only problem V had with Angel is that for an odd reason, she hated Rika. Whenever Rika walked into the room, Angel growled and walked away. When Rika tried to cuddle with V, Angel jumped on the couch and sat on his lap demanding attention. Rika hated Angel and Angel hated her. She tried to convince V to get rid of Angel because her excuse was it was “damaging the relationship”. He told her no that he rather lose her than Angel. Angel barked and slept with V while Rika was planning on a thing called Mint Eye. Rika told V about her idea and Angel went and laid on top of V and growled at her. A sun can always disappear but an Angel will always be there.

MC’s Dog: Shin the Dalmatian

This dog is legit the worse dog guard ever. Zen convinced MC to get a dog to make sure she is safe and protected. She told Zen she already had a dog and that her name was Shin and that she was your pride and joy. The whole RFA felt better knowing you had a dog there ready to protect its master from any harms way.

V saw the messages and began to freak out thinking the dog could possibly smell the bomb so he just never logged back in LMAO IM SORRY HE HAS IMPORTANT SHIT TO DO

However, MC didnt tell them that Shin is the most friendliest dog ever. She plays with everyone and loves to play little jokes. MC usually smiled because Shin had the same personality as the person who gave MC the adorable Dalmatian, MC’s grandfather c: Whenever she had to make phone calls or answer emails for the party, Shin was mostly annoyed because she wasn't getting any attention

BONUS

When MC heard her window shattered she was frighten seeing a white haired man in her home. She knew that was Unknown but before she could say anything, Shin jumped ontop of the man knocking him to the floor. Shin was wagging her tail with a ball in her mouth. Unknown did not expect that reaction.

EXTRA BONUS

Unknown started to play fetch with Shin and joined them for dinner eating spaghetti with them.

Seven’s Dog: Chip the Shibu Inou

He was inspired to get this dog because he saw a meme on social media about Doge and he wanted one so bad. Screw Elly, if she didnt want or need his love, he was going to give it to someone who needs it. He decided to go to a shelter hoping he can find famous meme breed and after 8 different shelters, he couldn't find the meme breed D: He was beginning to lose hope but he decided to try one more shelter. When he entered the shelter, he saw a 7 month year old Shibu Inu and he screeched like a little girl. He ran towards their cage and was beginning to baby talk to it. He paid for the papers and everything. He didnt prepare to have a animal in its home, so he fed it honey buddah chips. When the dog stuck his face inside the bag it got stuck and Seven began laughing. He removed the bag from the puppies face and noticed there was a chip on it heads. He decided to call his perfect companion Chip :) Short for Honey Buddha Chips :) The thing he loves the most is named after his love :,D

Seven decided to wear a Shibu Inu costume and slept on the floor with Chip so Chip wouldn't feel lonely :,) After a couple of days later, he brought chip to sleep with him in his bed because the floor was getting uncomfortable. When Chip started to sleep with Seven, Sevens nightmare started to fade away. The guilt he carried inside his head and heart was being cured by chip, but it didnt mean his episodes stopped. One night Seven was having episodes when he was coding because he thought he saw a code saying “Saeran” in binary and he totally lost it. He fell to the ground crying grabbing his own hair. Chip grabbed a potato and ran to Seven giving the potato to him. He then went on his lap and cuddle him giving of “I'm here, everything will be okay vibes” :)

Jumin’s Dog: King Charles the German Shepard

Jumin only thought about getting a dog because he was getting tired of Saeyoung trying to sneak into his pent house and grab Elizabeth 3rd.

He knew Saeyoung could get past the guards and fuck up the security system easily, so he decided to tell Assistant Kang to look for breeder that has the highest qualifications to breed guard dogs. He finally got the information from Assistant Kang and personally went with Elizabeth 3rd to find the perfect dog to protect Elizabeth. Of course Elizabeth must come along to help him find the perfect dog that is suitable for her taste. He had Elizabeth the 3rd in his arms with security guards around him because he was paranoid a dog might react aggressively seeing a precious feline.

He entered the training camp and noticed how obedient the dogs where, but they already belong to the trainers. The breeder took him to the 1-2 year old dogs who matured enough to be obedient. He walked in the special area and there was this black German Shepard that has been eyeing Jumin and Elizabeth from far away. Jumin didnt notice because he was noticing how Elizabeth the 3rd was feeling a bit nervous. Jumin didnt notice that there was an untrained angry dog on the lose and it was heading towards Elizabeth the 3rd. Elizabeth knew she was in danger and jumped out of her fathers arm and ran for it, she put Forest Gump to shame, she was having her own kitty Vietnam flashbacks. Jumin notice the angry dog about to attack Elizabeth till a black German Shepard who've been observing the whole situation decided to attack the other dog and defend Elizabeth. The two dogs were fighting till the owner of the untrained dog got a hold of the rude dog and took him back to his cage for training. Jumin ran quickly to the fierce black German Shepard and notice it had a bite mark around its neck. He noticed Elizabeth 3rd climb onto the back of the dog and licked the battle wound and Jumin fell in love with the dog. He bought the dog right away and he was preparing paperwork to sue the trainer for almost hurting his precious feline. He welcomed King Charles with open arms because it saved his heart, his everything, Elizabeth 3rd.

BONUS

Jumin left a camera in the penthouse and camped out in his car to see if King Charles can do his job

1 hour later Seven sneaked in and right when he made it pass the kitchen, King Charles attacked Seven by barking and chasing him off the penthouse.

Jumin trained him to not the hurt the RFA but to scare them LMAO

when he noticed everything on the camera, he bought King Charles a diamond collar.

Jaehee’s Dog: Mocha the Beagle

This precious little Beagle is Jaehees best friend. She is always waiting for Jaehee to come home from a long day of being Jumins slave. She picked up Mocha while she kicked off her shoes and threw her fake as glasses on the couch. She gave Mocha a quick kiss on her adorable forehead and gently flicked her long soft ears. UGH MOCHAS EARS.

Jaehee then went to kitchen and placed Mocha on the chair and began talking to Mocha about her day while making coffee. People may not believe her when she tells them, but Mocha actually responds back by giving different variations of a bark. If she disagrees with something, mostly what Jumin makes her do, Mocha gives a mad bark with a little growl. If she agrees, she barks happily with a little pant.

Jaehee just smiles at her canine thanking the moment she first met Mocha.

*flashback*

It was a heavy rainstorm that on particular night and Mr. Han offered to take Jaehee to her apartment because she took a cab to work. She politely agreed and hold and umbrella over Mr. Hans head so he wouldn't get wet.

Her whole left shoulder was soaking wet but she had to do it for her boss. They were halfway there to the limo but she heard a faint cry. She stopped and Mr. Han got a bit week and looked annoyed. He was tugging her to continue walking but she didnt. She kept looking for the noise and saw a box with a little head poking outside of it. She dragged Mr. Han to the car and pushed him inside and ran back to help the helpless creature. She almost lost her job but she knows Jumin cant find no one better than her. :)

3K notes · View notes

mastcomm · 5 years ago

Text

Wuhan Coronavirus, Impeachment, Kobe Bryant: Your Monday Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good morning.

We’re covering the first cases of the Wuhan coronavirus in Europe, the results of a key election in Italy and the death of the retired basketball star Kobe Bryant.

Coronavirus outbreak intensifies and spreads to France

As of this morning, the outbreak of a mysterious coronavirus has killed at least 80 people in China, sickened thousands and spread to at least 10 countries. That includes three confirmed cases in France, the first European country on that growing international roster. Here’s the latest.

Almost all of the worldwide infections involve people who traveled from China. A top health official in Beijing warned on Sunday that the spread of the disease was accelerating, partly because it was being carried and transmitted by seemingly healthy people.

Yesterday: Five million people left Wuhan, the Chinese city where the virus originated, before travel was restricted, the city’s mayor said — a stunning disclosure that intensified questions about the government’s delayed response.

Related: China’s flawed response to the outbreak may be another sign of how President Xi Jinping’s political dominance hampers internal debate over key policy decisions, analysts tell our correspondents based in Beijing.

What’s next: The Chinese government has extended the end of the weeklong Lunar New Year holiday by three days, to next Sunday, in an effort to to temporarily limit travel.

Italy’s League party loses a key election

The party of the nationalist leader Matteo Salvini lost a regional election on Sunday that he had hoped would set the stage for his return to power — a prospect that once thrilled Europe’s populists and menaced its establishment.

Mr. Salvini had campaigned feverishly before the vote, in the northern region of Emilia-Romagna, in the hope that a victory would provide ammunition in his calls for early national elections. But voters there, who have typically supported communist and leftist parties, rejected his anti-migrant League party’s candidate by a margin of around five percentage points.

Go deeper: Five Star, an anti-establishment party in Italy’s governing coalition, was humiliated in the election, raising more questions about its viability in the wake of its leader’s resignation last week.

How Iran covered up its deadly mistake

Come clean or I’ll resign. That’s what President Hassan Rouhani of Iran told top commanders who had been covering up the accidental downing of a Ukrainian passenger jet over Tehran.

It was only then — three days after the plane crashed in early January — that the country’s supreme leader ordered the government to acknowledge its fatal mistake.

We have an in-depth report on the cover-up and its political implications. Key takeaway: The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, an elite force charged with defending Iran’s clerical rule at home and abroad, effectively sidelined the elected government in a moment of national crisis.

How we know: Our reporter interviewed current and former Iranian officials, ranking members of the Revolutionary Guards and people close to the supreme leader’s inner circle.

In Baghdad: In a protest organized by an anti-American Shiite cleric and armed groups with ties to Iran, an estimated 200,000 to 250,000 Iraqis gathered on Friday to protest the United States military presence in the country. (An American drone strike that killed a top Iranian commander in the Iraqi capital on Jan. 3 has prompted widespread public anger.)

How solid are Europe’s post-Holocaust values?

World leaders and dignitaries will gather today for a solemn ceremony at Auschwitz in Poland to mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the former Nazi death camp.

But these days, our Warsaw bureau chief writes, some worry that Europe’s post-Holocaust values are being eroded amid a surge of anti-Semitism and dehumanizing political rhetoric on the Continent and in the United States.

Even the memory of Auschwitz — where 1.1 million people, mostly Jews, were murdered — has been weaponized. Case in point: A ceremony at a Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem last week was clouded by a bitter dispute over World War II history between Poland and Russia.

Yesterday: Mark Rutte of the Netherlands became the first Dutch prime minister to apologize for his country’s role during the Holocaust and its lack of action against the persecution of Jews.

Related: In the first installment of “Beyond the World War II We Know,” a new Times series, a United States Navy veteran looks at how her family fled Nazi Germany weeks before Hitler invaded Poland.

If you have 8 minutes, this is worth it

The risky journey to Europe

After the great migration of 2015 — in which more than a million undocumented people landed in Europe — the authorities in Turkey, Greece and Hungary responded by reducing undocumented migration by more than 90 percent.

Now, migrants who risk the journey to Europe travel up and over the icy hills and mountains that line Bosnia’s border with Croatia.

The terrain, pictured above, contains land mines from the Balkan wars. And the Croatian authorities typically force all who cross safely to turn around, without letting them apply for asylum.

Here’s what else is happening

Impeachment: John Bolton, the former U.S. national security adviser, writes in a book draft that President Trump wanted to continue freezing $391 million in security assistance to Ukraine until officials there investigated his political rivals. The revelation could complicate the case that Mr. Trump’s lawyers plan to make at his impeachment trial.

Israeli politics: Middle East experts see the Trump administration’s long-awaited peace plan for the region — which the president is expected to lay out when he meets Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel in Washington today — mainly as a “booster shot” for Mr. Netanyahu’s desperate campaign to stay in power.

Retired basketball star dies: Kobe Bryant and his 13-year-old daughter were among the nine people killed in a helicopter crash outside Los Angeles on Sunday. His death generated an outpouring of grief across the United States and beyond.

Surveillance in London: Privacy groups criticized a decision by the city’s Police Department to begin using facial recognition technology that identifies people on a police watch list as soon as they are filmed on a video camera.

Grammy Awards: Billie Eilish won record, album and song of the year, but Kobe Bryant’s death overshadowed the ceremony. We have live updates, a rundown of who won and a look at red carpet fashion.

What we’re reading: This Boston Globe investigation of the government’s inaction on E. coli outbreaks. The story of a 2-year-old boy who ate some of his father’s salad and developed the illness is “heartbreaking, terrifying and riveting,” writes our Times Insider editor, Jennifer Krauss.

Now, a break from the news

Cook: Slow cooker red beans and rice takes only about 20 minutes to set up in the morning.

Go: Our critic writes that the Berlin Philharmonic is playing with “enthusiasm and virtually flawless precision” under its new chief conductor, Kirill Petrenko.

Smarter Living: Wirecutter recommends five cheap(ish) things to radically make over your cluttered closet.

And now for the Back Story on …

Bill Clinton’s impeachment

We asked Peter Baker, our chief White House correspondent, to reflect on a major moment in the lead-up to the last presidential impeachment and compare it with the current trial. He has covered both.

Twenty-two years ago this week came a milestone moment in the last presidential impeachment drama. President Bill Clinton was on the defensive after The Washington Post, where I was working then, broke the news that Ken Starr was investigating whether he committed perjury to cover up an affair with a onetime White House intern.

Mr. Clinton took to the microphone at the end of an event, glared angrily at the reporters in the room, wagged his finger and, with Hillary Clinton standing behind him, forcefully said, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky.”

We were struck by two things: One, that he seemed to briefly blank on her name, referring to her as “that woman,” before summoning it. But the second was the intensity of his denial. He was white-hot mad. At that time, before the DNA and the grand jury testimony, we didn’t know if the story we were pursuing was bogus or if the president of the United States was lying to us and to the country. Of course, later we found out which it was.

Now, as Ken Starr re-emerges as a lawyer for President Trump in the current impeachment trial, and the administration’s explanations of what happened continue to fluctuate, it’s hard not to feel déjà vu.

That’s it for this briefing. See you next time.

— Mike

Thank you To Mark Josephson and Eleanor Stanford for the break from the news. You can reach the team at [email protected].

P.S. • We’re listening to “The Daily.” Our latest episode is about how the issue of fracking could determine who wins the swing state of Pennsylvania in the 2020 election. • Here’s today’s Mini Crossword puzzle, and a clue: Chunk of ice (four letters). You can find all our puzzles here. • Monica Mark is our next Johannesburg bureau chief. She has covered some of the biggest stories in Africa for Bloomberg News, The Guardian and BuzzFeed News.

from WordPress https://mastcomm.com/event/wuhan-coronavirus-impeachment-kobe-bryant-your-monday-briefing/

#Event

0 notes